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My name is Wim Visser, ex Italian international rugby player and Level III coaching qualification. I must agree with Nick, the so called lesser nations in rugby at the moment are closing the gap on the so called power house nations. ( I do believe that this is due to the fact that many of these players are playing and being exposed to foreign competitions which in the long term on a whole benefits that specific nations rugby because of the standard of rugby being played and the competitive nature of the specific leagues ie: Celtic league/Heineken Cup/Top 14/Premiership)
The Italy's/Samoa's/Argentina's are no longer push over matches and in general are decided in the later part of the game whereas in the past they used to be push over matches.
What Italy did against France on Sunday in Rome at the "Stadio Olimpico" demonstrates this to the maximum, in the past they definitely would have got stage fright but on Sunday a great team defensive effort , self belief pulled them through to cause an awesome positive result classed as an upset. I believe these so called upset results are going to become more of the norm with the lesser nations in the future, so yes definitely the power house nations Like the All Blacks, Aussie's and of course South Africa would make a grave mistake to enter a test verse these lesser nations with a complacent attitude, it could be a recipe to disaster.
