Italy started their campaign in Paris and more than held their own against the World Cup finalists before slipping to a 30-12 defeat before running champions England very close in Rome in a 19-15 reverse.

Unfortunately Italy undid much of their good progress under new boss Jacques Brunel when they slumped to a 42-10 defeat against Ireland, shipping five tries in the progress.

But McLean maintains that was more of a blip than the start of the terminal decline and says Italy won’t be daunted by facing a Wales team fresh from winning the Triple Crown.

He said: “Looking at the last three games we would have hoped to get at least one win or two but we can say that our performances in periods of the game have been very good.

“We have dominated spells of 40-60 minutes but in rugby can you can get punished if you are poor for just ten minutes.

“Our goal has to be to maintain the level for the whole 80 minutes against Wales. They are a very good attacking team and if our defence is not good for the whole game we will get punished.”