Edinburgh’s free-scoring revival under acting head coach Duncan Hodge floundered in spectacular fashion at BT Murrayfield with their first-ever home loss to Guinness PRO12 basement side Zebre.
Outplayed for over an hour, it seemed as if the capital club would get out of jail when tries from Ross Ford and former Dunfermline prop Murray McCallum gave them a narrow lead going into the final ten minutes.
But Italian international wing Giovanbattista Venditti sucker-punched the home side with a late try to give Zebre their first win of the season, their first ever at Murrayfield and one they unquestionably deserved on the run of play.
For all their big wins and attractive rugby in the last three weeks, Edinburgh were clueless for long periods against a tenacious defence – that had lost 122 points in the last two games – and then unforgivably lax when they finally managed to muscle themselves ahead.
Just about everything that could go wrong did for Edinburgh in a dreadfulfirst-half display that saw them lose a shedload of lineout and scrum ball and nine points.
Carlo Canna’s simple penalty gave Zebre a three minute lead and they handily dealt with some multi-phase Edinburgh attacks before the Italian international stand-off booted a second penalty from close range on 26 minutes.
A head knock saw Stuart McInally forced off for Edinburgh but they opted to kick an easy penalty chance to the corner and then lost the lineout.
Then the home pack were shoved off their own scrum in their 22 just before the break, setting up Canna for the easy drop goal to take his side in at the half 9-0 ahead.
Edinburgh’s shocking night continued with prop Alan Dell spilling the ball in contact as he went for a try with the home side trying to inject some pace into the game, but instead Canna’s third penalty stretched Zebre’s lead out to 12-0 ten minutes into the second half.
Canna missed a tough chance to stretch his side still further and Edinburgh kicked and wasted a further three penalties to the corner before finally Ford went over from another lineout drive just after the hour and Kinghorn landed the touchline conversion.
Suddenly Edinburgh had a second wind and a multi-phase attack with replacements du Preez and Hidalgo-Clyne prominent ended with McCallum squeezing over for the try, the scrum-half converting.
But with three minutes left Zebre worked an overlap as Damien Hoyland went for an interception allowing replacement Federico Ruzza to send in Venditti, the international wing making the conversion easy for Canna.
Att: 3304
Edinburgh: B Kinghorn; D Hoyland, C Dean, P Burleigh, T Brwon; J Tovey (G Bryce 63), S Kennedy (S Hidalgo-Clyne 63); A Dell, S McInally (R Ford 14), F Arregui (M McCallum 49); B Toolis, G Gilchrist (F McKenzie 56); V Mata, J Hardie (C du Preez 46), M Bradbury.
Zebre: E Padovani, G Bisegni, T Boni, T Castello, G Venditti; C Anna, M Violi; A Lovotti, T D’Apice, D Chistolini (G Roan 61); G Biagi (capt), Q Geldenhuys; M Mbanda, J Meyer, A van Schalkwyk (F Ruzza 52).
Ref: M Mitrea (FIR)