“We’re very pleased with the result especially for all the people behind the scenes who are working hard to give the team every chance,” said Ruddock. “I’m especially pleased for the players. They have the potential to become a great team but to do that they have to be clinical enough to get results like this.
“It’s the old cliché about taking one game at a time but that’s exactly what we are doing. I have encouraged the players to play a certain style of rugby an entertaining and hopefully a winning style of rugby. If people are getting excited about this team then we’re obviously doing something right.”
Forwards Jonathan Thomas, Robert Sidoli and Brent Cockbain all scored their first international tries while Tom Shanklin and Shane Williams maintained their recent scoring streak with a try apiece. Man of the match Martyn Williams also went over.
Ruddock said: “I was pleased that we took the initiative by scoring the first try. I thought Ireland let Italy come at them the week before so I impressed on the players that we had to go and win this in the first sixty minutes rather than leave it to a moment of individual skill.
“We took the game by the scruff of the neck. What’s more, no one panicked when they scored and Captain Gareth Thomas has to take a lot of credit for that. In the end we had more than enough to win.”
