James Lawton: Enthralling mixture of flaws and glory entrances fans

It is not often that you see in the course of a few minutes all the glory and the deepest flaws of the greatest football nation the world is ever likely to see.

But it happened in Suwon yesterday when the Brazilian defender Edmilson explained why he and his team-mates seem certain to keep their nation in a fever of both hope and dread over the next two weeks or so. One moment Edmilson was walking in the footsteps of all the Brazilian virtuosos. His superb overhead kick brought a breath-taking goal in the extraordinary break-out of exuberant talent which brought a 5-2 win over Costa Rica. Then he defended so crassly it was easy to understand the catch of anguish in the voice of his coach Luiz Felipe Scolari, when he said: "There is good development in my team, great strength – but also great weakness. If we cannot defend better we will not compete with the top teams."

Who did he have in mind? No doubt more than any other team it was Italy, stealthy, cynical, endlessly resilient Italy, but this is a World Cup plainly intent on producing some violent changes to the old script, if not an entirely new order of the world game.

Italy were almost a parody of themselves as they hung on desperately to the ledge over which the world champions, France, and the favourites Argentina had disappeared in successive days. Their 1-1 draw with the Group G winners Mexico edged them into the round of 16 but they go there, probably against the United States, with none of that old aura of assassins-in-waiting.

Their fabled coach, Giovanni Trapattoni, patrolled the touch-line in a frenzy of indecision as Mexico scored a sumptuous headed goal and the golden boy Francesco Totti almost disappeared before his coach made his hiding place official. Trapattoni might claim a masterpiece of improvisation with his resurrection of the former wunderkind Alessandro Del Piero, whose beautifully taken goal confirmed the salvation already promised by Ecuador edging their way to a surprising 1-0 win over Croatia. But the jarring truth was that if Italy are to make still another date with Brazil in the final in Yokohama on 30 June they, like the South Americans, have to attend to some very basic business.

Calls for the head of the captain, Paolo Maldini, have been growing and it did not help that the veteran maestro of defence revealed a slowing of the old instinct when he allowed Jared Borgetti to run free, and onside, to head home the perfectly judged ball from the magnificent Cuauhtemoc Blanco. But Italy's problem ran even more deeply than a new vulnerability to an attacking ruse dreamed up in Central America.

Earlier they had collected five bookings, two for diving, as they repeatedly revealed their anxiety at the prospect of joining France and Argentina.

This was not the Italy that the world has come to know and to respect and to hate. If there was cynicism it too often came dressed in the crudest sharp practice. Trapattoni's mystique was around the level of Gordon Strachan's on one of those bad old days at Highfield Road. Christian Vieri's power was too easily shackled and Filippo Inzaghi jumped uneasily at this chances.

But for Italy there is always defence and Alessandro Nesta and Fabio Cannavaro were recognisably themselves, which is to say as obdurate as an old stone wall. It is here that Italy will re-build themselves if they can, and where Brazil, who now emerge as the creative light of this tournament, are most like to be betrayed.

Edmilson's crime was indifference. For any Brazilian, attack is a joy and defence a chore and rarely can this psychological division of labour been more starkly underlined than when Edmilson allowed his man to run unchallenged to make the cross from which Ronald Gomez scored with a free header.

Perhaps Scolari will remind his men of the betrayal that came in what some consider the best World Cup game ever played, between Italy and Brazil, in the the old Sarria stadium in Barcelona in 1982. Junior, who was supposed to be a defender, went on a carefree run soon after Roberto Falcão had scored the goal which seemed to ensure the passage of the team of Socrates and Zico into the semi-finals. But Junior was caught, and the ball was delivered to the feet of Paolo Rossi. Italy went on to beat Germany in the final.

Then, the Italian coach, Enzo Bearzot, was said to have released the "caged bird" of Italian football. Here, Trapattoni must first re-impose the kind of competitive discipline which has always been the mark of an Italian team.

Scolari has the even heavier burden of imposing basic defence. His team, in which Ronaldo, as he promised before the kick-off this World Cup, is finding much of his old lust to run at a defence, was always likely to run over a group comprising such lightweights as China and Costa Rica. But if it should happen that Michael Owen finds himself confronted in a possible quarter-final by the kind of irresolution which allowed Brazil's latest victims frequent runs at goal, he has good reason to believe that his recent thin pickings could easily be enriched.

If Brazil and Italy do make it to Yokohama, it will be their third World Cup final confrontation. One of them, in Mexico City's Azteca Stadium in 1970, carried the game to the stars. The other, in Pasadena's Rose Bowl 24 years later, reminded Americans of their old belief that in "soccer" a goalless draw can be about as thrilling as kissing your sister.

Here, though, we ponder majestic football and some new uncertainties. Can Brazil build themselves a real foundation for a return to the glory? Can Italy re-discover the black art of winning from behind? In a World Cup bursting with intrigue, and surprise, this is the nearest thing to a familiar theme. It is, in a strange way, magnificently re-assuring.