Bergamasco worth a king's ransom

On a day cold enough to strip the skin from a salami, the 60,000 crowd were warmed enough to forget that no Scottish winger, never mind a forward, could have produced such a moment of exhilaration.

But there was so much more to the Italian. He hit rucks with an intensity and he hit Martin Leslie with a good enough right hook to suggest that his artistry came coupled with the aggression needed to make it at the very top.

Later, wearing shirt and braces and confidence mixed with humility, his curly locks flowing over the neck and shoulders of an assassin, he looked ready to sling a gun over his shoulder and accompany the young Michael Corleone on a walk in the Sicilian hills.

'I just think run, run,' he explained more succinctly than his modest English might normally allow when asked to analyse his try. His story will run and run.

'Mauro needs the challenge of top professional rugby,' said Italian coach Brad Johnstone while accepting that the domestic game in a land obsessed by soccer could ill-afford his departure.

'He is playing for a Benetton side that is winning but against very poor opposition. Any top athlete needs to be stimulated and he needs more stimulation.

'He could play anywhere in the world and will command big bucks. He will undoubtedly take over from Diego Dominguez as the next role model of Italian rugby. He is a young man with a big future.'

A swimmer at national level and a one-time high-class gymnast, Bergamasco seems destined to become Italy's first rugby superstar.

What of Scotland? The best that can be said is that they won. A meagre four-point margin of victory at home to Italy may sound unimpressive but it would have been much worse had they lost. And that seemed a possibility in the closing minutes.

For once Scotland had a solid kicking performance to thank for the outcome. Duncan Hodge accumulated 18 points with his boot, including five penalties.

Tom Smith scored their only try and it says something about the lamentable lack of penetration behind the scrum that the prop looked Scotland's most potent attacking weapon.

Coach Ian McGeechan saw it differently. 'It was a good all-round team performance,' he claimed. That, frankly, was an astonishing verdict.

Spin of that proportion could make him a natural successor to Alistair Campbell if ever Tony Blair is looking for a replacement.

Scotland lacked much but primarily they lacked a Bergamasco.