Last season's Grand Slammers Wales come into their fourth Six Nations match of the season away to Italy here on Saturday not just looking for a victory but also to put points on the board.

The reigning champions are playing a bit of catch up having been beaten by France in Paris and know that in order to arrive at next week's crunch clash against Ireland in Cardiff with a chance of retaining their crown, they need to run in some scores at the Stadio Flaminio.

One reason for that is that Ireland came here last month and wracked up an impressive 38-9 victory which sees them holding a superior points difference of 23 over Wales.

The Welsh cannot be expected to roll Ireland over in Cardiff so if the Emerald Isle beats Scotland this weekend, Wales will need to win by at least 10-15 points more to put themselves in a championship-winning position.

So it made it all the more surprising when coach Warren Gatland made nine changes from the France game two weeks ago.

Among those he has picked Ospreys's James Hook at fly-half in place of Scarlet's Stephen Jones.

However Hook is confident he and his team-mates can still produce the goods.

"There was probably a little bit of surprise about the number of changes made to the side but I don't really think you could call it a gamble on Warren's part," said Hook.

"He has faith in all of us as players or he wouldn't have made these changes.

"We made too many mistakes in the French game (two weeks ago). There were four errors in quick succession leading up to one try, yet we could still have won the game.

"So against Italy it will be about us cutting out the mistakes.

"Italy are maybe not as gifted as other teams in the Six Nations but they are a gutsy side, especially at home. They give 100 percent every game.

"I've already heard someone talk about points differences but we have to get out there and win the game first. Then, hopefully, everything else will follow."

For Italy it has almost already got to the stage where they are playing for pride following crushing defeats to England (36-11), Ireland (38-9) and Scotland (26-6).

Their last two games are against Wales and France, both at home and former Australian under-19 international Luke McLean, Italy's fly-half, believes they need to be more creative with their attacking play if they are to arrest their run of heavy defeats.

Italy have only scored one try and 26 points in their three matches so far.

"We've had our game plan, it's quite simple and other teams probably realise that," he said.

"We tried to change it up this week where we've tried to bring in a couple of other facets with people running different lines because it has got a little bit stale and everyone knows if I get the ball who we're going to hit, there's no deception so that's something we've worked on this week.

"Especially against Wales you've got to because they're a team that mounts so fast in defence, they're not a team that waits for you.

"Whereas against Scotland you can probably just play wide because you know you're going to get over the ad (advantage) line because they wait for you.

"But Wales don't do that, they look to hit the line and make those tackles so you've got to look for those little spaces in between players."

Last year in Cardiff Italy suffered their heaviest defeat of the campaign, going down 47-8.

Similarly, four years ago they were thrashed 38-8 at home but the last time the teams met in Rome it was the hosts who ran out 23-20 victors.

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