Football Worldcup History

There's no doubt that the FIFA World Cup is the most expected sports event in the world. Indeed, ever since the first tentative competition in Uruguay in 1930, FIFA's (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) flagship has constantly grown in popularity and prestige.

A bunch of visionary French football administrators, led in the 1920s by the creative Jules Rimet, are credited with the original idea of bringing the world's strongest national football teams together to compete for the title of World Champions. The original gold trophy bore Jules Rimet's name and was contested three times in the 1930s, before the Second World War put a 12-year stop to this popular tournament.

And when it resumed, the football World Cup rapidly reached its undisputed status as the greatest single sporting event of the modern world. Held since 1958 alternately in Europe and the Americas, the World Cup broke new ground with the Executive Committee's decision in May 1996 to select Korea and Japan as co-hosts for the 2002 edition.

It's important to say that since 1930, the 16 tournaments have seen only seven different winners. However, the FIFA World Cup has also been punctuated by dramatic upsets that have helped create footballing history - the United States defeating England in 1950, North Korea's defeat of Italy in 1966, Cameroon's emergence in the 1980s and their opening match defeat of the Argentinean cup-holders in 1990....

Nowadays, the FIFA World Cup holds the entire planet under its spell. The last World Cup Germany 2006 got extraordinary numbers in terms of audience, breaking many records.

2010 FIFA World Cup will be the 19th FIFA World Cup, an international tournament for football that is scheduled to take place between 11 June and 11 July 2010 in South Africa. It will be the first time that the tournament has been hosted by a nation in the Confederation of African Football, leaving the Oceania Football Confederation as the only FIFA Confederation never to have hosted the event.

And the Next world cup will be the 20th World Cup, an international tournament for football, that is expected to take place between June and July 2014 in Brazil.