ROME (Reuters) — The crisis rattling Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right government has not gone away even after the Italian prime minister sailed through a parliamentary confidence motion that could have triggered early elections.

Wednesday's vote in fact showed relatively little about the real balance of power in parliament and the result was never in doubt once the rebel group of deputies behind Berlusconi's arch-rival Gianfranco Fini said they would back the government.

Rather than a decisive showdown, the confidence vote resembled an uneasy truce between two fighters circling each other before trying to land a decisive blow.

Despite the ferocity with which the two sides have traded insults and accusations over recent weeks, neither Berlusconi nor Fini would have much to gain from an election straight away.

In July, when Berlusconi expelled Fini from the People of Freedom party they created in 2008, the prime minister talked seriously about resigning and asking President Giorgio Napolitano to call new elections.

Since then he has been more reticent and now says he intends to serve out his term until it ends in 2013. "Because he read the opinion polls," was the slightly cynical explanation from Italo Bocchino, one of Fini's closest allies, last week.

Berlusconi's approval ratings have been on a steady slide since he came to power in 2008, buffeted by scandals, squabbling and economic problems ranging from high unemployment to sluggish growth and bloated public debt.

He can draw comfort from the fact that the badly divided centre-left opposition has done even worse but even if he were to return to power, he would probably emerge weaker from any election held this year.

As for Fini, most surveys credit his group with no more than seven to eight percent of the vote. New elections would cost him his influential post as parliamentary speaker and cast him into the obscurity of small party opposition.

Now there is the prospect of a prolonged period of political guerrilla warfare.

Financial markets have spared Italy the turmoil that swept over Greece and Spain but it will struggle to get its disordered public finances under control, while youth unemployment is running at 27 percent and growth prospects are sluggish.

However the big political battles are likely to be over issues such as measures to cut the length of criminal trials and the ferocious attacks on Fini mounted by newspapers close to Berlusconi.

One key problem is likely to be justice reform and in particular, the Fini camp's approach to the legal difficulties confronting Berlusconi, who faces prosecution over cases including accusations of bribing British lawyer David Mills. He denies any wrongdoing.

Fini's supporters say they are prepared to support measures that would grant immunity from prosecution to Berlusconi while he is in office but they have rejected his repeated attacks on "politically motivated" magistrates.

They also say they expect to influence any reform proposals as they go through parliament. "Our members in the justice commissions in the lower house and Senate will verify them as they are worked on and then the whole parliamentary group will give their opinion," Fini said.

A controversial proposal to limit the use of police wiretaps, which critics see as a device to protect Berlusconi associates implicated in corruption scandals, could also trigger renewed confrontation.

They will also want to see an end to the attacks on Fini by Il Giornale, a daily owned by Berlusconi's brother. It has published daily reports accusing Fini of wrongdoing, which he denies, over an opaque real estate deal in Monaco.