| South Africa 2010 | |
|---|---|
 2010 FIFA World Cup official logo | |
| Tournament details | |
| Host country |  South Africa |
| Dates | 11 June – 11 July |
| Teams | 32 (from 6 confederations) |
| Venue(s) | 10 (in 9 host cities) |
← 2006 2014 → | |
The 2010 FIFA World Cup will be the 19th FIFA World Cup, the premier international football tournament. It is scheduled to take place between 11 June and 11 July 2010 in South Africa. The 2010 FIFA World Cup will be the culmination of a qualification process that began in August 2007 and involved 204 of the 208 FIFA national teams. As such, it matches the 2008 Summer Olympics as the sports event with the most competing nations.
This will be the first time that the tournament has been hosted by an African nation, after South Africa beat Morocco and Egypt in an all-African bidding process. This decision left the Oceania Football Confederation as the only confederation yet to host the FIFA World Cup. Italy are the defending champions. The draw for the finals took place on 4 December 2009 in Cape Town.
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Host selection
Africa was chosen as the host for the 2010 World Cup as part of a policy to rotate the event among football confederations (which was later abandoned in October 2007). Five African nations placed bids to host the 2010 World Cup:
Egypt
Libya /
Tunisia (co-hosting)
Morocco
Following the decision of the FIFA Executive Committee not to allow co-hosted tournaments, Tunisia withdrew from the bidding process. The committee also decided not to consider Libya's solo bid as it no longer met all the stipulations laid down in the official List of Requirements.
After one round of voting, the winning bid was announced by FIFA president Sepp Blatter at a media conference on 15 May 2004 in Zürich. South Africa was awarded the rights to host the tournament, defeating Morocco and Egypt.[1]
| Voting Results | |
|---|---|
| Country | Votes |
| South Africa | 14 |
| Morocco | 10 |
| Egypt | 0 |
During 2006 and 2007, rumours circulated in various news sources that the 2010 World Cup could be moved to another country. Some people, including Franz Beckenbauer, Horst R. Schmidt and, reportedly, some FIFA executives, expressed concern over the planning, organisation, and pace of South Africa's preparations. However, FIFA officials repeatedly expressed their confidence in South Africa as host, stating that a contingency plan existed only to cover natural catastrophes, as had been in place at previous FIFA World Cups. [5]
Qualification
As the host nation, South Africa qualified automatically for the tournament. Nonetheless South Africa participated in World Cup qualifiers because the CAF qualifiers also served as the qualifying tournament for the 2010 African Cup of Nations. They were the first host since 1934to participate in preliminary qualifying. As happened in the previous tournament, the defending champions were not given an automatic berth, and Italy had to participate in qualification.
The qualification draw for the 2010 World Cup was held in Durban, South Africa, on 25 November 2007.
List of qualified teams
The following 32 teams qualified for the final tournament.
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This is the first World Cup that does not include any teams that are qualifying for the first time, although two of the qualifiers (Slovakia andSerbia) have previously appeared only as parts of former competing nations. Slovakia was previously part of Czechoslovakia, and Serbia has competed as part of Yugoslavia and Serbia and Montenegro. In both cases FIFA considers these teams to have retained the earlier nations' records.
Controversy surrounded final qualification matches played between France and the Republic of Ireland, Costa Rica and Uruguay and Egypt and Algeria in November 2009.
play-off between France and the Republic of Ireland, French captainThierry Henry, unseen by the referee, illegally handled the ball in the lead up to the winning goal, which saw France make the final 32 teams ahead of Ireland. The incident caused widespread debate on how matches should be refereed at the highest level. FIFA rejected a request from theFootball Association of Ireland to replay the match, [6] whilst a widely reported later request by Ireland to be included as an unprecedented 33rd World Cup entrant was later withdrawn.[7][8]Costa Rica complained over Uruguay's winning goal in the CONMEBOL–CONCACAF playoff, [9]whilst Egypt and Algeria's final match was surrounded by reports of crowd trouble.
In response to the incidents during qualification, and to a match fixing controversy, on 2 December 2009 FIFA called for an extraordinary general meeting of their Executive Committee. After the meeting, FIFA announced that they would be setting up an inquiry into technology and extra officials in the game, but they did not announce the widely-expected move of fast-tracking the introduction of goal-line referee's assistants, already being trialled in the Europa League, and instead restated that the competition in South Africa would be officiated as before, with just one referee, two assistants, and a fourth official.[10] On the subject of fair play, FIFA President Sepp Blatter said:
I appeal to all the players and coaches to observe this fair play. In 2010 we want to prove that football is more than just kicking a ball but has social and cultural value...So we ask the players 'please observe fair play' so they will be an example to the rest of the world.—FIFA President Sepp Blatter, [11]
Venues
In 2005, the organisers released a provisional list of twelve venues to be used for the World Cup: Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Durban, Johannesburg (two venues), Kimberley,Nelspruit, Orkney, Polokwane, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria, and Rustenburg. This was narrowed down to ten venues[12] which were officially announced by FIFA on 17 March 2006
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Sth Africa
World cup 2010
| Johannesburg | Durban | Cape Town | Johannesburg | Pretoria |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Soccer City | Moses Mabhida Stadium[3] | Cape Town Stadium[4] | Ellis Park Stadium | Loftus Versfeld Stadium |
| 26°14′5.27″S27°58′56.47″E | 29°49′46″S 31°01′49″E | 33°54′12.46″S18°24′40.15″E | 26°11′51.07″S28°3′38.76″E | 25°45′12″S28°13′22″E |
| Capacity: 91,141 | Capacity: 70,000 | Capacity: 69,070 | Capacity: 62,567 | Capacity: 51,760 |
 |  |  |  |  |
| Port Elizabeth | Bloemfontein | Polokwane | Rustenburg | Nelspruit |
| Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium | Free State Stadium | Peter Mokaba Stadium | Royal Bafokeng Stadium | Mbombela Stadium |
| 33°56′16″S 25°35′56″E | 29°07′02.25″S26°12′31.85″E | 23°55′29″S 29°28′08″E | 25°34′43″S 27°09′39″E | 25°27′42″S30°55′47″E |
| Capacity: 48,000 | Capacity: 48,000 | Capacity: 46,000 | Capacity: 44,530 | Capacity: 43,589 |
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