Their pack has always been able to mix it with the best, with it including the likes of the world-class Parisse, but this time Italy's backs stood up to be counted with Orquera turning in a man-of-the-match performance at fly-half and winger Giovanbattista Venditti proving a real handful.
Di María did not look like the world-class player we have seen either, but you cannot expect that straightaway.
Fernando Torres, perhaps rushed back from his abductor muscle injury, seldom looked like the world-class striker he is reckoned to be.
For most of us, the real problem is that we don't look like the world-class distance runners Kara Goucher or Meb Keflezighi, yet we sort of imagine we do.
And yet two years after the release of the final episode, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II, it is Watson, rather than either of her male colleagues, who looks like the world-class performer, the daredevil, the movie star.
I know it's a flat pitch, but Michael Clarke is probably the best player of spin in the world, so it was money for old rope for him, Haddin was punishing us at will, and Swann looks nothing like the world-class bowler that's got 250 Test wickets".
As she climbs onto the starting blocks, Susan looks every bit like the world-class athlete that she is.
TV Guide film critic Maitland McDonagh noted that in the film Cruz "expertly mines the contrast between chic, compliant, white-clad Anna and funky, street-smart Melody, who treats [Martin Freeman's character] Gary like the world-class drag he is".
"Going to a club like Manchester City, with the world-class players he'll be playing with week-in, week-out, the chances that they create throughout games, I think he'll do fantastically well," said Monk. "Hopefully he goes there and produces the kind of football that he helped produce here and I'm sure he'll do that".
Alfred Hitchcock pulled it off with Grant and Kelly in "To Catch a Thief," a bauble that sparkles like a jewel because of the world-class scenery, its stars included, and because of, well, the directing.
A year ago, his arrival from Arsenal was seen to be a major coup, but he has since played for the most part like an impostor, unrecognisable from the world-class talent who thrilled the Emirates.
