Wales need to rack up the points in Rome if they are to snatch a third Championship in four years from under the noses of England and Ireland. But Gatland is keen to stop Italy’s powerful pack at source before they go all-out to keep the scoreboard ticking over.
He said: “For Italy, for me, it’s very simple about the game. They get their confidence from two areas. If their scrum and driven line-out goes well, then they build the confidence around all other aspects and areas of their game.
“The worst thing for us would be to go out and try and score 40 or 50 points against Italy, end up playing too much rugby early on and lose the game and then find that Scotland and France win and we have potentially cost ourselves a championship.
“We have got to be smart about the way we approach the game. It’s about accumulating points, it’s about doing a job up front and then if things go well then maybe being able to open up things later in the match. It’s making sure we don’t get too far ahead of ourselves.”
Wales sit in third position in the Six Nations stakes with a points difference of +12. England lead the way with +37 and Ireland are five behind in second. Gatland has been forced into two changes in the front-row as Aaron Jarvis and Rob Evans come in for the injured duo of Samson Lee and Gethin Jenkins.
The bench is also loaded with firepower. Gareth Davies could make his first Six Nations appearance of the season and last week’s match-winner Scott Williams will also be waiting in the wings.
And Gatland is expecting this season’s championship to go down to the wire on Super Saturday.
He said: “We said after the disappointment of the first game that it was about getting back on the horse, building some momentum and putting ourselves in contention. We have done that. Maybe it might come down to points difference and we will look back on things like conceding a last minute try to Scotland and two or three of those kind of things could be the difference between winning and losing the championship.”
