Brian O'Driscoll's Diary: The game against Italy was one of the least interesting, least enjoyable games I have played in and one of the few times where I was delighted to hear the final whistle.

From a backs' perspective it was a terrible game in that you could barely employ anything that might set you apart from the opposition. We wanted to run the ball, get out wide and take them on but you had to heed the prevailing conditions.

Just getting ball in hand was a challenge, any sort of passing was difficult in the extreme and it was largely about one-pass plays; it's not all that attractive to the eye and certainly wasn't any fun to be part of. You just have to tough it out, make the best of it.

Allowing for those handicaps, I thought we did reasonably well as a back line, getting ball to the wings and looking to impose our patterns. We broke them down at times but overall the conditions would have suited them.

My try wasn't exactly conceived on the training ground. Strings (Peter Stringer) got sloppy ball coming out of a ruck and he popped it up to me and it stuck on my left-hand side. My natural reaction was to attack on that way. I went running across, saw Mal (Malcolm O'Kelly) running a great line and did a dummy switch. He held a couple of defenders and, to be honest, from there I was focusing on trying to give the pass.

The defenders just kept stepping off so I couldn't get the pass away to Axel (Anthony Foley). Their winger was staying out, even though I was running towards him trying to draw him to me. Suddenly a gap opened between him and the hooker. At that stage I knew I had the angle and just enjoyed the whitewash coming into view.

It's funny what goes through your head at those moments. I got a memory flash of (Christophe) Dominici against the Italians and resolved to get the ball down as quickly as possible and to avoid banging it off my knee. I don't want to be a candidate for the "What Happened Next" slot on A Question of Sport.

That try obviously allowed me to slip past my close friend Denis Hickie in the Irish try-scoring stakes and I wasn't surprised to find a text message from the aforementioned Leinster wing when I got back to the dressing-rooms.

He tried to be gracious and almost succeeded. It went along the lines of, "I guess I should, sort of, kind of, maybe, perhaps congratulate you on your try scoring record . . . B*******."

If I was to keep a ratio of anything like that (one try every two games or so), I'd be very satisfied. Tries are harder to come by these days with that little bit of extra attention but I would also get a buzz from giving scoring passes or just contributing positively to the team.

Much was made of the high tackle on Italian scrumhalf Paul Griffen (pictured right). My gut reaction at the time was that it was a very harsh decision and I didn't deserve to be sin binned. In fairness to the officials the angle they saw it from might not have afforded them an ideal view.

I remember being sinbinned once before for a high tackle on Mick Smyth while playing for Blackrock against Terenure. I knew straight away I had caught him high and that there was nothing I could do about it; there was no question but it was a yellow card.

This time I just felt I hit the ball and because he was particularly light, his neck jerked and his feet went a bit airborne. It had all the effects of a high tackle. I have seen the still frames and it shows I hit right on the ball, which is stuck on his chest. I thought it was unjust (to be sinbinned) to say to least.

The post-match dinner was a subdued affair and to be honest the players were pretty relieved to head back the team hotel, either chilling out or heading off to bed. We were allowed Sunday afternoon off, it being Mother's Day, and it was nice to head off to my sister's house where I had a lovely family meal. We were ribbing Simon and Guy Easterby because they had get back into their "number ones" as they headed out for a family dinner in Killiney Castle Hotel.

When we moved back to Citywest I bumped into Ken Doherty and we had a quick chat but I haven't noticed too many of the other snooker players. Maggsie (Kevin Maggs) has been in watching the snooker most nights as he is a big fan.

That's actually an understatement; he's probably closer to being a stalker. He's been hanging round the practice table, hoping someone will take pity on him and give him a frame. He had hoped to get a lesson from Terry Griffiths but given the fact Mark Williams was knocked out in the first round, Griffiths had gone home.

The hype for the Scottish match is just ridiculous. Anyone who considers today's game a foregone conclusion might do well to re-evaluate their rugby knowledge. History illustrates the danger in underestimating any Scottish team and we certainly are not stupid or naïve enough to fall into that trap.

Matt Williams's "homecoming" will guarantee the Scots will be competitive. There is no way he's going to prepare a team to accept defeat. They don't want a wooden spoon or a whitewash.

The 50-caps landmark is not something that I thought about too deeply until it hit home during Tuesday's press conference: five years have flown by. It's a huge moment in my career and so exciting when you reflect on 50 Tests, with hopefully more to come.

I'm a little more selfish these days in that I don't want to be just getting caps, I want to be achieving things with Ireland, winning things. Our hard work is now leaving us in situations where destiny is in our own hands.

This weekend is all about the team, winning this game. If it's the worst game in rugby history and we win, I won't care. The only commodity that matters now and in the future is a victory.

- In a interview with John O'Sullivan