Veteran flanker Mauro Bergamasco was moved to scrum-half as Italy coach Nick Mallett on Wednesday named his team to play England in their Six Nations opener at Twickenham on Saturday.
The surprise move came after Simon Picone, Pietro Travaglio and Pablo Canavasio were all ruled out by injury.
Stade Francais flanker Bergamasco, who picks up his 70th cap, will partner Padua fly-half Andrea Marcato who has been confirmed after solid displays in the autumn tests against Australia, Argentina and the Pacific Islanders.
Most of the backs have also been confirmed with Andrea Masi at full-back, Kaine Robertson and Mirco Bergamasco on the wings, and Gonzalo Garcia at inside centre.
Gonzalo Canale comes back at outside centre after the injury that kept him out of the last two autumn tests.
Also returning from injury that made him miss Italy's three defeats is lock Santiago Dellape' who resumes his second-row partnership with Marco Bortolami.
Italy, who were left smarting after their first ever defeat to the Paficic Islanders, can also count on veteran tight-head prop Martin Castrogiovanni, returning after almost a year out.
The Leicester Tigers player rejoins Saracens hooker Fabio Ongaro and State Toulouse loos-head prop Salvatore Perugini.
Italy's feared pack is completed by a back-row trio of flankers Alessandro Zanni and Josh Sole and No.8 and captain Sergio Parisse of Stade Francais.
Mallett said last week that beating England would be ''like winning the Tri-Nations''.
He also said he hoped to catch the 2003 world champions and 2007 world runners-up ''off-guard''.
Mallett is aiming to repeat Italy's best-ever Six Nations campaign in 2007 when they won two matches, against Scotland and Wales, including their first away win, in Edinburgh.
Like Italy, England are trying to recover morale after bruising autumn losses to southern hemisphere giants Australia, South Africa and New Zealand.
England coach Martin Johnson sprang a surprise in the run-up to the game by axing Wasps star fly-half Danny Cipriani in favour of former Leicester Tigers mainstay Andy Goode, now at Brive.
Here is the Italy team for Saturday's game:
15-Andrea Masi,
14-Kaine Robertson,
13-Gonzalo Canale,
12-Gonzalo Garcia,
11-Mirco Bergamasco,
10-Andrea Marcato,
9-Mauro Bergamasco,
8-Sergio Parisse (captain),
7-Alessandro Zanni,
6-Josh Sole,
5-Marco Bortolami,
4-Santiago Dellape',
3-Martin Castrogiovanni,
2-Fabio Ongaro,
1-Salvatore Perugini.
Replacements:
16-Carlo Festuccia,
17-Carlos Nieto,
18-Tommaso Reato,
19-Jean-Francois Montauriol,
20-Giulio Toniolatti,
21-Luke McLean,
22-Matteo Pratichetti.
