2010 FIFA World Cup qualification the finals, with CONCACAF's fourth-place team facing CONMEBOL's fifth-placed team, and AFC's fifth-placed team facing the winner of the OFC. As the host nation, South Africa qualified automatically. As in 2006, the current cup holders – Italy – did not qualify automatically. For FIFA World Cup qualifying stages the method used for separating teams level on points is the same for all Confederations, as decided by FIFA itself. If teams were even on points at the end of group play, the tied teams would be ranked by: This is a change from 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification, where results between
History of the FIFA World Cup clubs (not national teams), each one of which represented an entire nation. For this reason, neither was really a direct forerunner of the World Cup, but notwithstanding that, the Thomas Lipton Trophy is sometimes described as "The First World Cup", at the expense of its less well-known Italian predecessor. In 1914, FIFA agreed to recognise the Olympic tournament as a "world football championship for amateurs", and took responsibility for organising the event. This led the way for the world's first intercontinental football competition, at the 1920 Summer Olympics, won by Belgium. Uruguay won the tournaments in 1924 and 1928. In