Dewi Lake: What Steve Tandy asked Wales players before Italy game

Wales captain Dewi Lake has hailed Steve Tandy for developing a special bond that helped end a 15-game, 1099-day losing streak in the Six Nations Championship with a 31-17 win over Italy.

Lake scored one of their four tries, with Aaron Wainwright getting a brace and Dan Edwards one, to help Wales claim their first win in the Championship since beating Italy in Rome 29-17 in March 2023.

While it was their first success in 1,491 days since they saw off Scotland in February 2022, he said that the result was everything that they had been building towards with every game.

“I think he’s (Tandy) really brought this group together in terms of how much we care for each other, how much we trust each other. I think, you know, those little bonds, they don’t really come overnight.

“That’s something you have to spend time on, but I think we’ve spoken about being connected as a group, and that only helps you when you’re on the field, you know, in tough moments. You get through it together, you trust each other more.

“The amount of care he shows to us and to what we do on the field as well, not just him, but the whole coaching staff, his whole backroom staff. I think this group’s just become a lot tighter.

“It’s everything we’ve been building towards, everything we’ve been working for in the last two to three weeks. Our performances have built, and we’ve grown as a group, and I think from Scotland to Ireland, through to now.

“We asked in the week for our best performance of the campaign, and we got it. We’ve always got belief in ourselves, belief in what we do, what we can put on in the field.

“The important thing was what we did in the first half; we backed it up in the second half. Probably the flip side of Scotland, where our first half was good, but for the second half, we seemed to knock off. But we stayed in the game,” he said.

Ospreys hooker Lake, who is moving to Gloucester, has been an ever-present under Tandy and says that once they went into camp, the squad was able to block out all the outside noise about the politics surrounding the game in Wales.

“It’s easy, you know. I think when you get into camp and you’re within this group, everything that you work for, everything you put on the field is for the jersey, for results and for days like today.

“The 75,000 fans have come to watch and have supported us throughout tough times. Obviously, there’s a lot of noise, and there’s a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes in Welsh rugby.

“But once you get into camp and you’re focused week to week on building and growing as a team, I think all your focus goes into that,” Lake told the BBC.