FACTBOX: Berlusconi vs Veltroni - the battle to lead Italy

(Reuters) - Italy will hold a parliamentary election on April 13-14, three years ahead of schedule due to the collapse of Romano Prodi's centre-left government.

As Prodi has said he will not stand for re-election, centre-right opposition leader Silvio Berlusconi faces a new rival for the job of prime minister, Rome mayor Walter Veltroni.

Here are some facts about how two men who will face off at the ballot box measure up:

DIFFERENT GENERATIONS

The 71-year-old Berlusconi's former rival Prodi was only two years his junior. Veltroni is, by the standards of Italian politics, a youth at 52.

That may not necessarily be an advantage. Berlusconi won a landslide in 2001 when his challenger was the fresh faced Francesco Rutelli who, then aged 46, was Veltroni's predecessor as mayor of Rome.

TYCOON-TURNED-PRIME MINISTER VS CAREER POLITICIAN

Berlusconi was already Italy's richest man when he entered politics in 1994, having made his fortune in property and media.

Almost overnight he created his own party, Forza Italia (Go Italy!) and has led Italy twice, in 1994-1995 and again in 2001-2006, the only time in modern Italy's unstable political system that a prime minister has served a full five-year term.

Veltroni is a career politician who has been a local councilor, member of the Italian and European parliaments, and served as deputy prime minister in Prodi's first government in 1996-1998. He was elected Rome mayor in 2001 and again in 2006.

COMMUNIST HUNTER VS EX LEFTIST

When Berlusconi entered politics in the early 1990s, filling a political void caused by the 'Clean Hands' corruption probes which destroyed the ruling parties of the day, he said one of his motives was to save Italy from communists.

Often making outlandish accusations against communists, Berlusconi maintains that Italy is at threat from leftists, something his critics say is outdated Cold War rhetoric.

Veltroni joined the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in the 1970s. Once a major political force, the PCI rebranded after the fall of the Berlin Wall, dropping the communist tag and, last year, merged with the more centrist Margherita to create the Democratic Party with Veltroni as its head.

Today Veltroni sees himself as a moderate and often compares his politics with those of former British and U.S. leaders Tony Blair and Bill Clinton.

RICHES AND SOCCER VS FILMS AND BOOKS

With family holdings that include Italy's main private broadcaster, a publishing empire, insurance and top-flight soccer team AC Milan, Berlusconi is rated by Forbes as the 51st richest person in the world, worth an estimated $12 billion.

With his 'self-made man' image, Berlusconi is an example to Italians aspiring to improve their lot and join the jet set.

Veltroni's appeal is that of an intellectual. He was once editor of the party newspaper L'Unita. Even while busy as Rome mayor he continued to publish novels. A fan of jazz and movies, creating the Rome Film Fest from scratch in 2006.

WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT EACH OTHER

With the campaign yet to start officially, both candidates have made conciliatory remarks about each other, leaving open the possibility that they might consider forming a 'grand coalition' government together if the election result is close.

Before Prodi fell, the two party leaders were in talks about reforming the electoral system and were said to have got on reasonably well. "If there are people of good will on the other side, like Walter Veltroni, on things that we must do together, that is exactly what Italians would expect from us," Berlusconi said.

Veltroni has said he would not make keeping Berlusconi out of power the basis of his election campaign.

"This is a country that for the last 14 years the rationale has always been 'anti' -- anti-Berlusconi on one side, anti the left on the other," Veltroni told Reuters in an interview last year.

"The Democratic Party proposes to turn the page, to have positive politics, policies that are solutions to the country's problems."

(Reporting by Robin Pomeroy in Rome; Editing by Richard Balmforth)