The 19th FIFA World Cup football extravaganza will take off from June 11th-July 11th 2010 and the one month long premier football tournament will unveil in an African nation- South Africa. The qualification process for the ultimate football event began way back in 2007 with 204 national teams sieved to book a berth in the finals. And 32 teams qualified to the final tournament from the world over confederations while South Africa bagged the honour of hosting the spectacular event. The other African nations in the league were: Libya, Tunisia, Egypt and Morocco.

The lucky mascot for the FIFA World Cup 2010 is Zakumi, which is an anthropomorphised leopard sporting green hair. The name Zakumi is a combination of abbreviation ZA, which is shortened form of South Africa and Kumi means ?ten? in different African languages.

The FIFA World Cup Ball is called Jabulani which means- bringing joy to everyone in an African language and the ball is a product of Adidas.

South Africa has made it to the finals of the tournament automatically after being declared the host of the event. The final 32 teams come under eight groups that are as follows:

Group A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay and France

Group B: Argentina, Korea Republic, Nigeria and Greece

Group C: England, Algeria, United States and Slovenia

Group D: Germany, Ghana, Australia and Serbia

Group E: Denmark, Netherlands, Japan and Cameroon

Group F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand and Slovakia.

Group G: Brazil, Korea DPR, Cote d?Ivoire and Portugal

Group H: Spain, Honduras, Switzerland and Chile

The matches of the Word Cup are scheduled at the following venues: Durban, Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria, Port Elizabeth, Bloemfontein, Polokwane, Nelspruit and Rustenburg.