2010 World Cup in South Africa

The footballing world is already buzzing with excitement in the run-up to 23 November 2007, the day on which Durban will host the draw for the 2010 Soccer World Cup in South Africa qualifying teams and groups. World Cup Tournament will take place from 11 June to 11 July 2010. A record total of 204 teams have entered the race for one of the 31 places at the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa™. The tournament consists of two parts, the qualification phase and the final phase (officially called the World Cup Finals). The qualification phase, which currently take place over the three years preceding the Finals, is used to determine which teams qualify for the Finals. The preliminary phase, which began in the Oceanian Zone back in August 2007, is now in full swing, with only the Host Nation guaranteed a berth in world football's showpiece event. For World Cup 2010 finals tournament 32 teams competing for the title, at venues within the host nation (or nations) over a period of about a month. The 64 football matches of the 2010 FIFA World Cup will be played in nine cities of South Africa. 32 teams for the 2010 tournament will be the winners and runners up of the eight qualifying groups. These thirty two teams, divided equally into eight groups A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H each consisting of four teams. The groups are drawn up by the FIFA administration, again using seeding. The seeded teams being the host nations, the reigning champions, subject to qualification, and those with the best points per game coefficients over the qualifying phase of the tournament and the previous World Cup qualifying. Other finalists will be assigned to by means of a draw, using coefficients as a basis.