After Italy's captain's run today, Sergio Parisse spoke to the assembled media ahead of his side's 6 Nations clash with Ireland tomorrow afternoon.
Naturally, Conor O'Shea was a major point of discussion; the Irishman guided Italy to their first ever victory over a southern hemisphere nation when they beat South Africa in November, and despite last week's setback, there remains a sense that his Italy side is on the up.
Parisse revealed he was delighted when O'Shea had been appointed as successor to Jacques Brunel.
I find in Conor a coach who has the same vision as me. And it's an honour for me to work with him.
When he arrived in Italy it was very good news from my personal point of view.
He also provided an interesting insight into O'Shea's coaching methods since taking the helm, and the challenges faced by O'Shea which have held Italy back for years on end:
Conor's most important challenge is to change our mentality.
Zebre and Treviso play in a very negative environment, losing often. The attitude changes when you have criticism every week and no wins. It's human nature that you start believing you're not good enough.
It's difficult to expect a winning mentality from those players but Conor is so positive.
He has put in place an extremely professional environment with the national team, and we must try to pass this system onto Zebre and Treviso. It's not easy, but that's the point.
It’s not always the fault of the players, sometimes it’s that they play every single week in a negative environment, especially in Zebre. Treviso less, but Zebre play in a disaster situation at the moment, so it’s difficult to expect to have players with a positive, winning mentality.
That’s the huge challenge for Conor. We can’t change everything like that [immediately], but for the long-term project it’s important for him to put things in a good way to have the team playing in a good club environment.
Parisse also maintains that O'Shea 'believes in Italy', and suggested that at the age of 33, he's not certain how long he has left in his playing career.
Italy vs Ireland kicks off at 14:25 tomorrow.
