When the first World Cup was held in Uruguay in 1930 only 13 teams participated in the finals and every country that wanted to play in the tournament was welcomed with open arms.
Since then, the competition has grown in leaps and bounds and more than 200 countries have entered the first World Cup on African soil, where 31 countries will join the hosts South Africa at the finals in 2010.
To determine the finalists, Fifa stages a preliminary competition, which is played on a regional basis. The draw for this qualifying campaign will take place in Durban on November 25.
Excluded from Sunday’s draw are the South American and Oceania regions.
In South America all 10 teams play each other on a home-and-away basis, with the top four teams at the end of the qualifying campaign qualifying for the finals. The fifth-placed team will take part in a play-off against the fourth-placed team from the Central, North American and Caribbean (Concacaf) zone, with the winner from the home and away games advancing to the finals.
Also not participating in the draw on Sunday is the Oceania zone, where most of the ten hopefuls have already been eliminated after competing in the South Pacific Games earlier this year.
Fiji and Vanuatu emerged from that competition to join New Zealand at the Oceania Nations Cup, with the winner of that tournament qualifying for a play-off against the winner of the fifth round of qualifiers in the Asian group. The winner from the two matches will qualify for South Africa.
The first zone that will be drawn on Sunday will be the Asian zone, which will have four or five participants at the 2010 finals.
The 43 teams that entered the World Cup from the Asian zone have already been whittled down after the first round during which the 38 weakest teams participated in 19 home-and-away matches.
The 11 highest-ranked winners from round one earned a bye into round three, while the remaining eight teams will contest the second round, from which four teams will advance to the third round.
In the third round the five top seeds are joined by the 11 highest-ranked winners from round one, as well as the four winners from round two. They will be drawn into five groups of four teams, with each team in the group playing the other on a home-and-away basis.
The top two from each group will advance to round four, where the teams will be divided into two groups of five each, who again play each other on a home-and-away basis. The two top teams in each group qualify for the finals, while the two third-placed teams play-off against each other to determine which team plays against the winner of the Oceania zone.
The next zone that will be drawn in Durban is the Concacaf region, where the 23 lowest-ranked teams participate in round one. The 11 winners and St Vincent and the Grenadines advance to the second round, where they will be joined by the 12 other teams.
The 24 teams will be paired into 12 home-and-away games, with the winners going through to round three, where the teams are drawn into three round-robin, home-and-away groups of four teams.
The group winners and runners-up advance to round four, where a single group with six teams will decide which three teams qualify directly for the finals, while the fourth-placed team will qualify for the play-off against a team from the South American zone.
Once the Concacaf region has been drawn, Europe will be next, with the 53 countries being drawn into eight round-robin, home-and-away groups of six teams as well as one round robin, home-and-away group of five teams.
The nine group winners qualify for the finals, while the eight best second-placed teams advance to the second round, where the teams will be paired into four home-and-away series, from which the winners qualify for the finals.
The final zone that will be drawn is Africa, where the three first round winners join the 45 other African teams in round two. The 48 teams will be grouped into 12 round-robin, home-and-away groups of four teams, from where the group winners and eight best runners-up will advance to round three.
In round three the 20 teams will then be grouped into five round-robin, home-and-away groups of four teams, with the five group winners advancing to the finals.
Although South Africa have already qualified for the finals as host, they will participate in the African qualifiers as these also serve as the qualifying competition for the 2010 African Cup of Nations.
If qualified for the third round, South Africa will play in its group. The points it obtains will count towards the Africa Cup of Nations but not for the World Cup. – Sapa-DPA