Pretoria - Brazilian players are looking forward to Sunday's Confederations Cup Group B clash against Italy in Pretoria's Loftus Versfeld Stadium.

After the Selecao had comfortably beaten the United States 3-0, everybody was expecting Brazil and Italy to have already qualified by the time their game is played.

However, Egypt's sensational 1-0 win against Italy in the later game in Johannesburg put an end to that, and all four sides in the group can still advance to the semi-finals.

The constellation of the group is such that Brazil, Italy and Egypt could even advance to the next round if they lose or draw their final game and only Brazil, who are on six points, have their fate in their own hands.

All other teams (the US has only a theoretical chance as they need to make up six goals on Italy to qualify for the semi-finals) are dependent on the result of the other game.

Italy, like Egypt, are currently on three points, with the Italians having a plus one goal difference, while the Pharaohs have scored as many as they have conceded. The US have yet to secure a point.

Superstar Kaka said Brazil the game against Italy would decide first place in the group "and we want to top our group."

The midfielder, who has just joined Real Madrid from Serie A side AC Milan, said that the tactics of playing short balls had worked much better against the Americans than it did against Egypt.

"We have to try the same against Italy," he said.

Striker Luis Fabiano said that even though he did not score against the US, he was much happier after the game than he was after the match against Egypt, where he scored.

"We did well and we can now finish first in our group. We have to play well against Italy and then we will top the group," he said.

The side was especially dangerous from set-pieces. "We are working a lot on them and we practise different set-pieces. Everything is a result of hard work," he said.

Manchester City's Robinho, who scored one of the goals against the Americans, considers Italy as one of his favourite opponents.

"I have always been lucky against Italy and in the last game I scored a goal. I dont believe that we have to change our way of playing against Italy," he said.

"We try to mark strongly in the first quarter of an hour of the game to show that we want to win.

"Of course Italy is a traditional team with a very high quality and we have to adapt our tactics to suit their style of play."

Like Kaka and Luis Fabiano, Robinho praised the newcomers into the squad.

"Ramires is an excellent player who assisted in one of the goals," he said.

"All the other newcomers into the team are also very good and it just shows how much talent there is. Their introduction into the team did not change the way we played." (dpa)