Totti had sensationally been left out of the starting line-up by coach Marcello Lippi due to his lacklustre performances in the three first round matches. But the AS Roma striker settled a fiercely-contested second round tie by firing home from the spot after Lucas Neill had brought down Fabio Grosso.

Italy had Marco Materazzi sent off shortly after half time, but the three-time champions held on defiantly for a place in the last eight.

Meanwhile, Ukraine reached the quarter-finals after beating Switzerland on penalties.

The Swiss missed three spotkicks, but Ukraine's Artem Milevskiy, Serghiy Rebrov and Oleg Gusev made no mistake to seal a 3-0 shoot-out victory.

Switzerland are the first team to go out of the World Cup without conceding a goal and they are the first side not to score a single penalty in a shoot-out.

Ukraine will meet Italy in the quarter-finals in Hamburg on Friday.