Ben Vellacott outlines what Edinburgh need to do to get the right result at Benetton

The capital club went down 29-26 to Munster at Hive Stadium on Friday evening in a gripping encounter which left their top-eight hopes resting on results on the final weekend of the regular season. They travel to Italy to play Benetton on June 1 in what could turn out to be a straight shoot-out and any sort of win for Edinburgh would guarantee them a play-off place.

Benetton lost 56-35 to the Bulls in South Africa on Saturday and are level with Edinburgh on 49 points but the Scots are above them by virtue of having won more games.

Stadio di Monigo has been a tough venue for Edinburgh in recent seasons but if they play like they did on Friday they will be in with a fighting chance. Only Glasgow have beaten Benetton at their home ground in the league this season and Vellacott knows it could get noisy if they allow the hosts to build momentum.

“Obviously Benetton are no easy-beats anymore,” said the Edinburgh co-captain. “They are a top quality side and again they’ll be pushing for that top eight. They are lethal at home so we will have to put on a top performance.

“If we put on a performance like we did against Munster, which was like a proper Test match, we’ll go over there and give it our best shot.

“You’ve got to not let the crowd get involved. The Italians are very loud and once they get a bit of confidence, they really back their teams. We need to keep the crowd pretty quiet by going over there and doing a good job.”

Edinburgh’s only reward from Friday’s endeavour was a losing bonus point but it could yet prove crucial in the final analysis. Their performance was certainly a step up from the previous weekend’s win over Zebre and a sold-out Hive was the noisiest it had been all season.

The home supporters were particularly animated when referee Gianluca Gnecchi penalised Edinburgh after stand-off Ben Healy had been flattened by a late tackle from Munster’s RG Snyman. The Italian official decided Edinburgh’s Bill Mata had been over zealous in trying to remove Snyman from Healy but it was a strange decision and led directly to Munster’s fourth try.

“It’s an interesting call,” said Vellacott, diplomatically. “I didn’t get a proper look at it at the time, but we’ll go over it. Unfortunately the result went the wrong way and they scored from it. There was no real explanation from the referee. It is what it is.”

Vellacott felt his team got on the wrong side of the referee during the second half as Munster fought back after trailing at half-time. Despite the result, it was an encouraging performance from Edinburgh and heartening to see Duhan van der Merwe more involved, with the big winger looking more inclined to go hunting for the ball. He is likely to be a big player against Benetton as the race for play-off places goes to the wire.

“I have never seen a league like it and it makes it really interesting, doesn’t it, going into the last round of games,” added Vellacott. “Hopefully we get on the right side of the result.”