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England kept alive their unbeaten run in this year's Six Nations, recording a hard-earned 17-12 win over Italy in a dour game at Stadio Flaminio on Sunday.

St Valentine was martyred in Roma and buried on the Via Flaminia, and his death is celebrated on 14 February. Some 1740 years later England were nearly beaten and buried in the Stadio Flaminio and if they had been there death would have resulted in a massive celebration in Rome. It was close but not quite for the brave Italians who may just have played better than their English visitors.

The difference in the end was a try by Mathew Tait, a great try that swept down the England left and for once got the better of the defenders.

Ita v Eng: England player ratings
Ita v Eng: Italian player ratings
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The try started in innocuous fashion inside the England half. Right against the touch-line Ugo Monye skipped past Andrea Masi in a rare, missed tackle by the Italians. The wing sped off and then played inside to Delon Armitage who immediately gave to Tait who raced some 23 metres, past a desperately diving Tito Tebaldi to score.

It was the match's brightest moment.

There were others. There was a break by Mark Cueto off an inside pass from Armitage that ended when Monye kicked the ball out. Riki Flutey had a strong ruin f down the middle of the field off an inside pass from Monye till Craig Gower tackled him. Those were the other bright moments.

Those were England's brightest moments in a match of much kicking when the Italians showed more creative skills than England did, lacking just the speed to turn such moments into points. Italy were more inclined to counterattack than England.

The two packs matches each other. England were better in the line-outs twice taking Italy's throws and forcing Italy to throw shallow. Italy probably had a slight edge in the scrums, except for the very last, telling scrum. It was Italy's ball as the clock got closer to 80. England got a shove-on and won that rugby rarity - a tighthead. There was not much in it at tackle time and the penalty count was 12-11 in Italy's favour though Italy suffered the setback of a yellow card for Martín Castrogiovanni. But England was so ordinary that the ten minutes of the hirsute prop's absence ended 3-all.

It was a match that promised much. England won the kick-off and went wide right and left. Italy counterattacked and stretched the England defence. But this sort of thing did not often happen again in the match.

When Mauro Bergamasco was penalised for collapsing a maul Jonny Wilkinson, who had an anonymous match, goaled this one. 3-0 after 8 minutes. When Nick Easter was penalised at a tackle, Mirco Bergamasco with his strange kicking style made it 3-3 after 10 minutes.

After this Cueto had his run and Wilkinson was short with a long penalty attempt and then missed one of the easiest possible.

From a line-out following a penalty, Italy went wide to the left and Flutey was penalised at a tackle. 6-3 to Italy after 34 minutes.

Just before half-time Flutey had his break to set England on the attack. Tebaldi was penalised at a tackle and Wilkinson goaled to make the scores 6-6 at the break.

The second half had a plodding start till suddenly England burst out with Tait's try. Wilkinson missed the easy conversion but England led 11-6 after 48 minutes. At this stage one could easily believe that England were now going to run away with the match.

There was never any danger of that, not even when Castrogiovanni folded over a tackle and Wilkinson kicked the penalty. 14-6 after 57 minutes.

Italy played some of its best rugby after this and never looked yielding another point. In fact they created opportunities and when Simon Shaw was offside, Mirco Bergamasco make it 14-9 after 63 minutes. Bergamasco then goaled again when Steve Thomson went in at the side of a tackle. 14-12 with 9 minutes to play and the momentum very much with Italy. But England went on some phased attack and Wilkinson, as he has done famously before, kicked a right-footed drop goal to make the score 17-12 with 6 minutes to go.

The last 10 minutes were in fact exciting as the possibility of an Italian victory became real. To the end they looked to score a try to win the match but England had their measure.

Man of the Match: Tall Alessandro Zanni has had big boots to fill with the injury to Sergio Parisse but on Sunday afternoon in Rome he was splendid in his own right on defence and attack, a skilled player.

Moment of the Match: Mathew Tait's try.

Villain of the match: Martín Castrogiovanni, his team's prodigal, who gave away four penalties, as he did against Ireland, and spent time in the sin bin.

The scorers:

For Italy:
Pens: Mirco Bergamasco 4

For England:
Try: Tait
Pens: Wilkinson 3
DG: Wilkinson

Yellow card: Martin Castrogiovanni (Italy, 58th - repeated infringements at the breakdown)

Teams:

Italy: 15 Luke McLean, 14 Andrea Masi, 13 Gonzalo Canale, 12 Gonzalo Garcia, 11 Mirco Bergamasco, 10 Craig Gower, 9 Tito Tebaldi, 8 Alessandro Zanni, 7 Mauro Bergamasco, 6 Josh Sole, 5 Marco Bortolami, 4 Quintin Geldenhuys, 3 Martin Castrogiovanni, 2 Leonardo Ghiraldini (captain), 1 Salvatore Perugini.
Replacements: 16 Fabio Ongaro, 17 Matias Aguero, 18 Valerio Bernabo, 19 Paul Derbyshire, 20 Pablo Canavosio, 21 Riccardo Bocchino, 22 Kaine Robertson.

England: 15 Delon Armitage, 14 Mark Cueto, 13 Mathew Tait, 12 Riki Flutey, 11 Ugo Monye, 10 Jonny Wilkinson, 9 Danny Care, 8 Nick Easter, 7 Lewis Moody, 6 James Haskell, 5 Steve Borthwick (captain), 4 Simon Shaw, 3 Dan Cole, 2 Dylan Hartley, 1 Tim Payne.
Replacements: 16 Steve Thompson, 17 David Wilson, 18 Matthew Mullan, 19 Louis Deacon, 20 Steffon Armitage, 21 Paul Hodgson, 22 Toby Flood.

Referee: Christophe Berdos (France)
Assistant referees: Romain Poite (France), Pascal Gauzere (France)
TMO: Hugh Watkins (Wales)