It’s over for Warren Gatland, his Wales reign is finished
The game is up. Warren Gatland's position as head coach of Wales, were it not already, is untenable.
Some have come to that reality later than others - a staunch defence of Gatland at the Welsh Rugby Union's Annual General Meeting last November was met with rapturous applause - but it's becoming an increasingly inescapable fact that there is no future for Gatland in charge of the national team after this Six Nations.
In truth, the writing has long been on the wall. But now, as the possibility of Gatland leaving turns to near certainty, even his most ardent supporters are helpless to defend him.
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Beyond a miraculous turnaround in the second half of this tournament - and we're talking about as unlikely a Triple Crown attempt as there maybe has ever been - there will be a new coach in post ahead of the summer tour of Japan.
Other than the World Cup in France, which offered brief respite from the misery, his second stint in charge has been truly awful. That 2023 tournament - and the warm-up games before it - account for five of the six wins Gatland has managed since returning to the job.
Since his first game back against Ireland in 2023, there have been 20 defeats in 26 matches. It's all a far cry from his first stint in charge, with Grand Slams and World Cup semi-finals.
His time in charge between 2008 and 2019 saw him cement himself as one of the best to coach Wales. As well as those four Six Nations titles, his winning record with Wales was bettered by just four men - John Dawes, Mike Ruddock, Clive Rowlands and Graham Henry.
Yet Gatland the prodigal son has been one of Wales' worst coaches, statistically. Only John Ryan, David Nash and Ron Waldron have a worse winning percentage than Gatland's 23 per cent from the last three years.
When he took over from Wayne Pivac, Wales were at a low ebb. Ninth in the world and having recently lost to Georgia and at home to Italy - both unwanted firsts.
Well, Pivac lost to Georgia, but under Gatland, Wales have fallen below them in the rankings. Gatland has lost two of his three meetings to the Italians too.
It could well have been all three, were Kieran Crowley's Italy in 2023 able to be as pragmatic as Gonzalo Quesada's current outfit. Perhaps the better side that day, they didn't have the nous or game management required to beat Wales.
But they do now. Unfortunately, almost everyone in Test rugby seems capable of that now.
That win over Italy in 2023 remains Gatland's only Six Nations victory since returning. His only victory outside of that World Cup period.
Since then, it's been 16 months of defeats. Sixteen months of misery.
I've reported in person on 12 of this 14-match losing run. I've been there for 22 of Gatland's 26 matches in charge. I don't know whether Rome was the worst they've played. It was awful, bereft of game management.
Nadirs have just been kicked along the timeline, new rock bottoms declared and then retracted at the sight of the next burning wreckage the following week. I don't know where rock bottom comes for Wales and Gatland anymore.
Maybe this was it. Maybe it's yet to come in the next three matches. It won't be after that. That feels almost certain now.
Throughout this 14-match losing run, there's never been any real evidence that public opinion was turning on Gatland. Those representatives of member clubs at the AGM last year seemed more concerned with Jamie Roberts' punditry duties and what he said about Gatland than the actual Wales coach and his own part in all of this.
Not all of the ills in Welsh rugby are Gatland's fault. Years and years of systemic failure and self-interest have exacerbated the problems. Just like Pivac before him, Gatland has not been helped by the circumstances of Welsh rugby's inherent mess.
Of course, there are genuine questions to be asked of Gatland's own contribution to that, both in this stint and his previous. There have been missteps too, while his relationship with the professional clubs has rarely been smooth-sailing.
Parties on either side will see all that through different lenses. But look beyond it, at the facts in the cold light of day, and the ills of this team - and there are many - are Gatland's responsibility.
People will talk about a lack of talent at his disposal, pour scorn on the efforts of the professional sides or bring up the 25-cap rule.
Some arguments will have merit. Some won't. One comment on Facebook claimed the rule - again, the suggestion of scrapping it at the AGM was met with more applause - captured up to 80 players that Wales, as a result, couldn't pick.
Where do you start with that? Inherently, that's the problem in Welsh rugby's goldfish bowl - there's always another problem. That's why things are glacial in the game, because if there's another problem, there's another reason not to deal with the matter in hand.
Why bother fixing the broken leg? It won't do anything for the pain in my arm. That's about the gist of it.
The problems in Welsh rugby are multi-faceted. A lot of things can be true at once. This isn't the generation of players that Gatland once had.
But, conversely, this is a poorly coached international side. Perhaps the worst coached team in Tier One rugby - if 12th in the world still counts as that.
By the summer, with Japan just behind us, we could be lower. That could have ramifications for the draw for the 2027 World Cup, which Gatland has consistently said he is working towards.
What good is working towards it if you're already snookered by the time you reach Australia in two years' time?
Wales' identity, for a year now, has been muddled. At the World Cup, when Gatland had time with the squad to implement the nuts and bolts plan he wants, Wales were able to manage their way through games.
Since then, and the loss of some experience obviously doesn't help, Wales have just strayed to the point of middling mediocrity. There's no defining quality as a team to hang their hat on.
Gatland's teams at least used to be tough to beat. But the inability to execute a gameplan, as well as this odd characteristic to want to be a territory side that also plays good rugby, means they end up doing nothing.
In Rome, the kicking game was largely aimless as Italy managed that facet of the game - always crucial to the result in those conditions - to perfection. Wales' selection didn't help, with Ben Thomas better-suited to inside centre than fly-half.
But selection has been an issue throughout this losing run. Strange decisions that haven't paid off, experiments that were binned after a few attempts, players blooded - like Cam Winnett - and then just discarded.
That's the funny thing with this losing run. It's always felt like Wales have pressed the reset button on aspects of their gameplan in each campaign. They'll switch up the midfield, put a wing at 12 in the summer, then a playmaker there in the autumn.
So every campaign, they're starting afresh, trying to make the latest tactical rejig work. But there's no reset on the fundamental problems. No acknowledgement of the lessons they should have learned along the way.
And ultimately, that losing run only grows. There's no reset button on that.
This has been coming for some time. From the moment Gatland offered his resignation after last year's defeat to Italy, there's always been a question over just how committed he is to the task of rebuilding Wales from the doldrums. Just weeks before, he had been talking up the potential of that side.
The talk of building for the future has continued. They say a society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they shall never sit. But all this talk of planting seeds now has never felt like that.
There's always been a sadder resignation to it all. Whether it's fatigue over the question or whatever, there's rarely a direct answer recently when he's asked if he still wants to continue in the job. In the bowels of the Stadio Olimpico, the answer to that question immediately turned to the players.
When he was asked why things weren't clicking after the latest defeat in Rome, he asked what wasn't clicking?
"The results," was the response from the journalist posing the question. It is the results that are impossible to defend.
Some have taken longer than others to get to this point, but the end is nigh. That much seems certain.
