Both sides go into Saturday's meeting with two defeats so far in this year's tournament and the loser will be odds-on to claim the wooden spoon come the end of March.

Italy had that dubious pleasure in 2008 and 2009 but scrum-half Tito Tebaldi says the prospect of making it a third successive year isn't entering the players' minds.

"We are not thinking about the wooden spoon," said Tebaldi. "We will have to wait until the end of the tournament to see what happens. We just have to focus on giving a good performance to win this game.

"In order to beat Scotland, we will have to show the same heart as we did against England and have a bit more luck.

"We need to be efficient. We must try to stop them from playing their style of game. Perhaps this may mean a less entertaining game for the fans, but so be it."

Mallett has stuck with the same starting XV that lost to England as they look for their first win in the Championship for nearly two years - their last victory was a 23-20 home success against the Scots.

Meanwhile Scotland head coach Andy Robinson will be hoping the former Italian prop Massimo Cuttitta can give his side the inside track on the Azzurri front row in his new role as Scottish scrummaging coach.

Cuttitta knows full well the power of the Italian pack, renowned as one of the world's best scrumming outfits, and that information could help Robinson's side bounce back from the disappointing late loss to Wales.

But that task has been made even harder with Robinson being forced into making three changes, with Hugo Southwell, Simon Danielli and Max Evans replacing the injured Chris Paterson, Thom Evans and Rory Lamont.

There is also a change at loosehead with Allan Jackson starting in place of Alasdair Dickinson and fly-half Dan Parks is determined to put the Scots' poor history at the Stadio Flaminio firmly behind them.

Parks said: "This has never been an easy place for us and that is proven by the fact we haven't won there in a while.

"Obviously I played over there in 2008 when we lost 23-20 and that one was a hard defeat to take. But it is in the past now and all we are focused on is getting an important win.

"We believe we are very close to putting a good performance and result together and, hopefully, that will happen against the Italians."