The race for a spot in the 2010 FIFA World Cup will now get tougher and tougher. Even though some confederations have already started their qualifying tournaments a while ago we can say that now, when the European nations begin their battle, the world of football will turn their eyes attention to the World Cup qualifiers.

So here is an update from each confederation for you:

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UEFA

On Wednesday, 20^th of August, Kazakhstan hosted Andorra in the first match of the UEFA qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup. The match finished with a 3-0 score for the home team.

On the 6^th and the 10^th of September more than 40 matches will be played to complete the first two rounds of the UEFA qualifying tournament for the World Cup 2010.

Among those matches are:

Armenia x Turkey (6 sept)

Austria x France (6 sept)

Spain x Bosnia-Herzegovina (6 sept)

England x Croatia (10 sept)

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CONCACAF

The preliminary rounds have already been played and now we entered the final group stages of the Concacaf Qualifying process for the FIFA World Cup.

Also on Wednesday (20 Aug.) the first round of the group stage was played and here are the results:

Guatemala 0 x 1 USA

Cuba 1 x 3 Trinidad and Tobago

Mexico 2 x 1 Honduras

Costa Rica 1 x 0 El Salvador

Canada 1 x 1 Jamaica

Haiti 2 x 2 Suriname

The next rounds also happen on the 6th and 10th of September.

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CAF (Africa)

48 African nations are in dispute in the second round of the CAF qualifying tournament for the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

After four matches Cameroon, Guinea, Benin and Nigeria lead their groups with Cape Verde, Kenya, Angola and South Africa* coming in second.

The next batch of matches in this second round will be played on the 5^th, 6^th, and 7^th of September.

(*South Africa is automatically qualified as hosts of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. But, they are subject to the same rules as other nations for continuation to the next stage of the qualifiers. If they fail to advance from this group they could be eliminated from the qualifiers for the 2010 African Cup of Nations)

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AFC (Asia)

The fourth and final round of the AFC qualifiers for the World Cup starts on the 6^th of September for the 10 teams that made this far.

The nations are now split into two groups and the top two teams will automatically qualify for the 2010 WC.

Group A has Australia, Japan, Bahrain, Uzbekistan and Qatar

Group B has Korea Republic, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Korea DPR and United Arab Emirates

Some of the matches coming up are:

Bahrain x Japan (6 sept)

Saudi Arabia x Iran (6 sept)

Korea DPR x Korea Republic (10 sept)

Uzbekistan x Australia (10 sept)

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CONMEBOL

The qualifying process in the South American Continent almost a year ago and so far each country played six matches. Each team will play each other twice in a round robin tournament. At this point Paraguay leads the table followed by Argentina, Colombia, Chile and Brazil.

The next two rounds take place on the 6^th, 9^th and 10^th of September and the leaders will fight for the top of the table. Argentina will host Paraguay on the 6^th in Buenos Aires. On the same day Brazil will visit Chile trying to get closer to the top of the table.

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OFC

After the South Pacific Games in August of 2007 Fiji, New Caledonia and Vanuatu joined New Zealand for the final group tournament.

The group tournament is already going on and the next two rounds - on the 6^th and 10^th of September might be decisive to give either New Zealand or New Caledonia the first place on the table and the title of Oceania winners. That would give either one of them the chance to play the decisive match against an Asian country for that spot among the best 32 countries that will play in the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.