JOHANNESBURG, Aug 21 (Reuters) - South Africa will become the first World Cup hosts in more than 70 years to participate in its own qualifying competition, although they will play in the finals regardless of their performance, officials confirmed on Tuesday.
The African qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup are to be
combined with the preliminaries for the African Nations Cup
finals earlier the same year, necessitating the participation
of South Africa, the Confederation of African Football (CAF)
said.
While all the other African nations involved in the
qualifiers will be vying for spots in both tournaments, World
Cup hosts South Africa will only be chasing a berth in the 2010
African Nations Cup being held in Angola.
Similarly, Angola will be only trying to qualify for a
World Cup berth.
For the first time, Africa has a full quota of 53 entries
for the 2010 preliminaries, which will be divided into three
stages.
The bottom 10 African teams in the FIFA rankings have been
drawn into five preliminary round ties, which are to be played
over two legs in October and November.
FIFA says the draw has been conducted and is expected to be
announced in the next days.
The five winners will join 43 other countries in the first
group phase, where the teams will be divided into 12 groups of
four teams each at the World Cup draw in Durban on Nov. 25.
They will play six rounds of matches through 2008 with the
12 group winners plus eight best runners-up progressing to the
last league stage.
The 20 remaining teams are to be divided into a final stage
of five groups of four, with the resultant group winners going
onto the World Cup in South Africa and the top three in each
group qualifying for the 2010 Nations Cup finals in Angola.
Should South Africa finish top of their group, the
runner-up would qualify for the 2010 World Cup, officials told
Reuters.
The CAF also used the 2006 World Cup qualifiers to
determine its 16 Nations Cup finalists in Egypt the same year.
Africa are to have six teams at the World Cup finals for
the first time.
The only previous World Cup host forced to play a
preliminary tie was Italy in 1934. They played a single match
against Greece just months before the finals, winning 4-0 in
Milan before the Greeks withdrew from the return match.
