Zebre spoil the send-off for Zanni

ZEBRE secured the bragging rights in Italy by claiming a shock 17-13 win on Benetton’s patch.

It was a deserved victory for Zebre – just their fifth over their Italian neighbours in 18 meetings – and was built on tries from Tomasso Boni and replacement Jimmy Tuivaiti either side of the break.

Benetton legend Alessandro Zanni was given a guard of honour by both sets of players prior to kick-off on the occasion of the last match of his career, and the hosts looked to give their 119-cap Italy flanker the perfect send-off by taking the lead two minutes into the match.

Fly-half Paolo Garbisi slotted the ball between the posts after Zebre had infringed at the breakdown.

But it was the hosts who were in for a difficult evening with the referee, racking up a high penalty count which allowed Zebre to assert themselves.

Eleven-cap Azzurri centre Boni crossed for the first try of the match on 20 minutes, duly converted by Carlo Canna, who added

three more points just before Benetton had flanker Marco Lazzaroni sent to the bin.

Trailing 10-3 to start the second half, Garbisi added a second penalty for Benetton but Zebre held firm and saw replacement flanker Tuivaiti score just after the hour mark.

Joaquin Riera scored in the final minutes for Benneton which Ian Keatley converted, but it was too little, too late.

Benetton head coach Kieran Crowley conceded: “Zebre were too good. We gave away 30 turnovers, including 18 penalties, and you can’t win when you have that. For the first five minutes we controlled the game but after that we just gave away penalties and every time we got inside their area we turned it over.”