Taken from wikipedia for those who wonder why we are all so excited about the World Cup Since the second World Cup in 1934, qualifying tournaments have been held to thin the field for the final tournament. They are held within the six FIFA continental zones (Africa, Asia, North and Central America and Caribbean, South America, Oceania, Europe), overseen by their respective confederations. For each tournament, FIFA decides the number of places awarded to each of the continental zones beforehand, generally based on the relative strength of the confederations' teams, but also subject to lobbying from the confederations.
The qualification process can start as early as almost three years before the final tournament, and last over a two-year period. The formats of the qualification tournaments differ between confederations. Usually, one or two places are awarded to winners of Intercontinental Play-offs. For example, the winner of the Oceanian zone and the fifth-placed team from the South American zone entered a play-off to decide which team would qualify for the 2006 World Cup.[12] From the 1938 World Cup onwards, host nations have received an automatic berth in the finals. This right also used to be granted to the defending champion, but from the 2006 finals onwards, this entitlement has been withdrawn, requiring the champions to qualify as well.
The current finals tournament features 32 national teams competing over a month in the host nation(s). There are two stages, a group stage and a knockout stage.
In the first stage (the group stage), teams are drawn into eight groups of four. Eight teams are seeded at the draw (based on both current FIFA World Rankings and recent World Cups), and assigned a group. The other teams are drawn at random. Since 1998, constraints have applied to the draw to ensure that no group contains more than two European teams or more than one team from any other confederation. Each group plays a round-robin tournament, guaranteeing that every team will play at least three matches. The last round of matches of each group is held simultaneously to prevent collusion between nations. Since 1994, three points have been awarded for a win, one for a draw and none for a loss (prior to this, winners only received two points). The top two teams from each group advance to the second stage (the knockout stage). If two or more teams finish level on points, tie-breakers are used: first is goal difference, then total goals scored, then head-to-head results, and finally drawing of lots.
The second round, or knockout stage, is a single-elimination round in which teams play each other in one-off matches, with extra time and penalty shootouts used to decide the winner. It begins with the round of 16 (or last 16) in which the winner of each group (from the group stage) plays against the runner-up from another group. This is followed by quarter-finals, semi-finals and a final. The losing semi-finalists contest a third place match.
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