Wales vs Ireland LIVE: Hosts hammer visitors to claim 2019 Six Nations Grand Slam
Here's how the final day of the Six Nations championship played out
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Wales thrashed Ireland 25-7 to win the Six Nations Grand Slam.
Hadleigh Parkes' try inside just 70 seconds set the tone before fly-half Gareth Anscombe took over from the tee to add a further 20 points as the hosts hit the front and never looked back.
Ireland scored with the final play of the game to avoid being left scoreless but it was a day to forget for them in Cardiff.
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Some news that has broken from the England camp this morning that has come as a real blow for scrum-half Dan Robson.
The Wasps half-back had been left out of this week's team due to "illness" which has transpired to be blood clots in his leg, and it's serious enough that it could keep him out of the rest of the season - and put his place at the 2019 Rugby World Cup in major doubt.
The topic of concussion is one that rugby as a sport has considered thoroughly in the past few years at all levels, with considerable and necessary progress made in combating an issue too often trivialised.
Now available for all is Sam Peters' fantastic long read on rugby and concussion:
Italy and France are just finishing their final warmups, Jacques Brunel and Conor O'Shea patrolling, making their final checks.
With Fofana officially withdrawn, just six of the French starting fifteen have tasted victory away from home, a staggering stat that highlights both their inexperience and their atrocious form over the last few years.
Italy last beat their neighbours in 2013 behind a kicking masterclass from Luciano Orquera, and they've a real shot at replicating that performance today...
Two passionate sets of supporters from two passionate nations.
Not sure about this look, though...
This could well be a Six Nations farewell for Sergio Parisse, one of the true greats of the tournament, all-time leading appearance maker and so often a lone soldier in struggling Italian sides.
How he'd love to go out with victory...
The players are in the tunnel, France in dark blue jackets, game faces on, hands on hip, the steely Guilhem Guirado pensive as he prepares to lead them out.
Italy's change strip is white with green and red thing horizontal stripes. Sergio Parisse looks a touch emotional, understandably.
Over the running track they trot, and it's time for the anthems.
Before we hear the anthems, we will have a time for silence and reflection on the awful events in Christchurch this week.
A great rugby city that has suffered such adversity already this decade, and a quite horrible event.
Beautifully observed by all but one idiot inside the Stadio Olimpico, silence into applause as the minute wears on.
La Marseillaise is sung typically hearty by the French side, a tear in Mathieu Bastareaud's sizeable eye. Guilhem Guirado also looks emotional arm in arm with his mammoth centre.
Sergio Parisse gulps as the first strains of Il Canto degli Italiani play. Fist clenched over the Italian badge - a day to salute Italy's greatest rugby player as he farewells a tournament in which he has become so embedded.
It's time for kick-off.
A first Six Nations blow of the whistle for Matthew Carley and Romain Ntamack hoists high into the Roman sky.
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