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
FIFA Football 2002 to improve the FIFA ranking of their chosen team by participating in international friendlies. Many of the international teams in the game are not licensed (some of them down to the players' names like the Netherlands), as well as smaller countries such as Barbados, who were only given numbers as player names. Also, to date, this was the last "FIFA" edition (not counting the World Cup versions) to feature the Japanese national team, since Japan Football Association would go on to concede exclusive rights to Konami's "Pro Evolution Soccer" series. "FIFA Football 2002" ran for 10 years as the last