Third-place finish in rugby’s Six Nations behind world’s top two a positive, according to Scotland captain Jamie Ritchie

The Azzurri fought back from being 19-6 down in the second half to go within a converted try of overtaking their hosts and spent the final five minutes camped on the Scotland try-line.

Head coach Gregor Townsend’s men held firm, however, then broke away in added-on time to score their fourth try of the match via hat-trick hero Blair Kinghorn and record a bonus-point scoreline of 26-14.

"When you win a test match, it’s always a good feeling,” said Scotland captain Ritchie, 26.

“Italy have deserved more from this tournament. They’ve played a lot of good rugby and they put us under huge amounts of pressure. I’m delighted we won that.

“Credit to Italy for playing some really good rugby.

“At the end, Italy were five metres away from our line but we were confident in our defence and in how we were playing. I wasn’t worried and I didn’t feel anxious at all.

“It was a solid performance. We dug it out and we did well in the end.”

Looking back over the campaign as a whole and the Scots’ third-place finish, with 15 points from five games, he added: “Before the tournament, I said I wanted five good performances. We got four and a half.

“We’re third behind the two top teams in the world and that’s a positive.”

Third place was Scotland’s highest finish since 2018.