When 10-man Italy went one goal up in Bari on Wednesday, Giovanni Trapattoni would have looked left down the touchline towards Marcelo Lippi and been certain of the World Cup-winning manager's next move. Most of the other top sides in world football, in the very same situation at home against a side ranked 20-odd places below them in the FIFA rankings, would have viewed an opening goal as a beginning; in the unique case of Italian football it was treated as an end. And didn't Trapattoni just know it. Shutting up shop is a philosophy that Trapattoni, alongside the likes of Helenio Herrera, Nereo Rocca and assorted others, did much to indoctrinate into the psyche of Italian football over the past 50 years. So, in the seconds after Vincenzo Iaquinta put Italy ahead early on at Stadio San Nicola, the Irish manager probably knew how Lippi would react before the World Cup-winning coach had actually figured it out for himself.

That knowledge is why on Wednesday the caution we have been conditioned to expect from Ireland's manager was cast aside. And in pretty spectacular fashion, too. Against anybody else, a country, for example, that Trapattoni didn't know quite as intimately, he would have bided his time and watched how things worked out. Who knows, maybe we wouldn't have seen a change until the 80th minute. Against his fellow countrymen, however, he knew to what extent Ireland's opponents would retreat and reacted accordingly.

His decisions on the night justified the reverence he had been treated with in Bari in the days before the game. A request for a pizza or pasta by anybody who looked even vaguely Irish was greeted immediately with a question about Trapattoni. Around the old town his face was everywhere – on Eircom sponsored t-shirts, on posters promoting the game, across newspapers, even on the English menu of one enterprising restaurant. Italian journalists did not ask him questions; they instead delivered a short speech on why they felt he was so great and waited for him to respond to their eulogy.

After the game, security men, catering staff and cleaners gravitated towards the press conference room in the small hope of catching a glimpse of Trapattoni on his way in or out. Any visitor to the city uneducated in the ways of football would have been convinced that Trapattoni ran the country, healed the sick, turned water into wine, all that kind of stuff. The miracle-maker analogies were difficult to get out of your head when, away from home against the World Champions, you saw Trapattoni put on an extra striker after 22 minutes; when you watched Italy place nine players between Gianluigi Buffon and a spot 35 yards from their own goal for over an hour; when you saw Ireland equalise late-on and almost sneak a winner.

"The manager showed what a great manager is when he made changes early on after the sending off," said Shay Given, who can rarely have had such a quiet evening. "Other managers would have maybe waited until the second half, but he did it after 15 or 20 minutes, changed the system, changed the team , the whole team was set up to attack. That shows what knowledge he has. He deserves a lot of credit."

It's an acknowledgment an increasingly out-of-touch RTÉ television panel weren't willing to make but it wasn't all about Il Trap. When the changes were made and Ireland's players were encouraged to take the game to their opponents, they managed it with a degree of authority. Sure, the home side might have been willing to hand over the initiative but Ireland were both good and bold enough to seize it. To most, that they were capable of that will come as a surprise and within that number you may have to count the manager.

The most plausible explanation for the strait jacket he puts on Ireland, the one they wore forced to wear most visibly against Bulgaria, is that Trapattoni doesn't believe he has the players to dominate and beat a half-decent side, never mind the best ones. Against Italy, though, a handful proved him wrong. Take Stephen Hunt. So effective was the Reading player, first as a left winger, then as an extra central midfielder and finally as a right winger, that Lippi decided to bring on an extra full-back, Andrea Dossena, to deal with him. It was quite a compliment, one that Hunt was able to pick up upon. "Their left back I ended up against looked scared toward the end. You could really see it in his eyes… I was happy with that."

Glenn Whelan is another who stood out. He may not have the authority to dominate a game but his intelligent promptings are more than capable of nudging it in a certain direction. That applies similarly to Caleb Folan. He has an uncoordinated look about him but you can count the times on one hand that his touch let him down, or indeed, that he took the wrong option. Darron Gibson also deserves a place on the list of surprise Irish performers. The midfielder appeared to relish the task of passing the ball forward, rather than adhere to the crab football he had clearly been asked to play in his starts against Cyprus and Poland.

With the visible proof now in front of him that yes, maybe, this Irish side are actually capable of taking the game to an opponent, Trapattoni would appear to have more tactical options in front of him, particularly if he's forced to start without Aiden McGeady or Damien Duff in the future. But speaking on Thursday, his heart still appears tied to 4-4-2 and doesn't appear convinced that 4-3-3, despite it's effectiveness on Wednesday, is the way, or even a way, forward for players not used its workings. "I know, for example, that Doyle forced to play out-wide is not Doyle, it is not Doyle," he said. "The Italians they have the habit to play three. When the ball is here, we saw in the game, look they go, they cut across, they move for each other. I know the tactic of three, Italy know it too, they are used to it. That is a different situation for us, if you see English football. It is strong football, they play up and down the wings, there is good energy but not the habit of the movement. That needs training, training, training."

Perhaps over the next few weeks in Milan, when the emotion of Wednesday has fully settled, he might reconsider that stance but on Thursday he proved he was no stubborn fool – an accusation the Andy Reid situation has left him open to – in his words on Paul McShane. "John [O'Shea] gave the others the stability," he said of his decision to switch the Manchester United defender from centre-half to right back. "One more foul [down the right], they have Pirlo and there are many goals in free kick situations. Paul [McShane] marks the players more, he follows the players. We have to choose this position carefully in the next game."

That next game is the friendly against Nigeria at the end of May at Craven Cottage and aside from testing the likes of Kevin Foley, Stephen Kelly or even Eddie Nolan at right back just in case Steve Finnan's spell of injuries continue, Trapattoni has also promised to take a look at a number of other options. The Irish manager mentioned Liam Lawrence during the week, a player surely a more viable option than Andy Keogh on the right of midfield. After that, however, you can't imagine him experimenting too much. It's just not his way.

That encounter in Sofia now has a defining look about it. A victory would kill off Bulgaria's chances of making second and keep Ireland in contention to gain automatic qualification for South Africa. A draw, meanwhile, is the minimum needed to keep Trapattoni's side in the box seat for a play-off spot. Overall, it's likely to be a nervous encounter but as Kevin Doyle points out, Wednesday's result will ensure that no Irish player is too edgy heading into it. "You know, it's so long before you play another international game and then you go to Bulgaria and you feel you have to get a result there because you didn't get a result in Italy. In the meantime, you're with your club feeling a little down. So it's such a good feeling to go away happy and be able to forget about everything until June."

Then, it will be time for Trapattoni to work his magic all over again.

ccronin@tribune.ie