A late goal from Vincenzo Iaquinta settled the encounter in favour of the visitors from Udine at the Stadio Mario Rigamonti.

Brescia now only have Atalanta - their bitter Lombardy rivals - below them in the table and look in danger of fulfilling pre-season predictions that they would struggle to stay up after the retirement of Roberto Baggio last summer.

Baggio's four seasons at the Rigamonti may have been in his footballing dotage but he delivered a healthy mid-table position at the end of all four campaigns for the Rondinelle.

Brescia's desperation for points was there for all to see and after 21 minutes they created the first chance.

Jaime Wome tried his luck from distance but his left-foot shot and was saved low by Morgan De Sanctis.

That stirred Luciano Spalletti's Udinese into life and after 25 minutes it was Iaquinta who threatened as he was through with only Luca Castellazzi to beat.

However, he failed to test the goalkeeper as his shot went past the right-hand post.

Seven minutes later it was Udinese who went close again when Antonio Di Natale tried his luck from 25 yards but Castellazzi saved well.

A minute from the break Castellazzi made another fine save after a Iaquinta shot rounded off a counter-attack inspired by the quickthinking Di Natale.

Udinese continued to dominate when the game resumed after the interval.

After 47 minutes, Iaquinta turned his marker and fired into the sidenetting.

Five minutes later Iaquinta headed over the bar and on to the top of the goal from a cross from the right by Di Natale.

With 20 minutes remaining, Brescia almost caught their visitors out with a clever counter of their own.

Giuseppe Sculli did well on the left and beat David Pizarro but his right-footed shot was well saved by De Sanctis.

Five minutes later, Andrea Caracciolo forced De Sanctis into action again with a close-range header in what was Brescia's best phase of the match.

However, just as the home fans were scenting the prospect of scoring a goal that would earn three points that would lift them out of the bottom three they were caught by a sucker punch.

It was delivered by Iaquinta who got between Brescia players Luigi Di Biagio and Davide Zoboli to head in a cross from Marek Jankulovski.

Udinese thus leapfrogged Internazionale whose old bad habit of drawing once again cost them two points at Parma.

Now only Juventus and AC Milan are ahead of Udinese whose second win in a row shows they have recovered from the three consecutive defeats that derailed their own bid for the title.

Brescia boss Gianni De Biasi must be wondering how long he will be allowed to remain at the helm of a club that is looking in desperate need of a creator like Baggio.