2006 FIFA World Cup

The 2006 FIFA World Cup was the 18th instance of the FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which won the right to host the event in July 2000. Teams representing 198 national football associations from all six populated continents participated in the qualification process which began in September 2003. Thirty-one teams qualified from this process, along with the host nation, Germany, for the finals tournament.

The tournament was won by Italy, who claimed their fourth World Cup title. They defeated France 5–3 in a penalty shootout in the final, after extra time had finished in a 1–1 draw. Germany defeated Portugal 3–1 to finish third.

The 2006 World Cup stands as one of the most watched events in television history, garnering an estimated 26.29 billion non-unique viewers, compiled over the course of the tournament. The final attracted an estimated audience of 715.1 million people. The 2006 World Cup ranks fourth in non-unique viewers, behind the 1994, the 2002, and the 1990 FIFA World Cups. As the winner, Italy will represent the World in the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup.

Host selection

The vote to choose the hosts of the 2006 tournament was held in July 2000 in Zürich, Switzerland. It involved four bidding nations after Brazil had withdrawn three days earlier: Germany, South Africa, England and Morocco.Three rounds of voting were required, each round eliminating the nation with the least votes. The first two rounds were held on 6 July, and the final round was held on 7 July. Morocco was the first to be eliminated when it got only three votes out of a possible 24; England was eliminated in the second round with only two votes. Finally, Germany won the final round of voting 12–11 over South Africa, but the success of Germany's bid was marred by a hoax bribery affair which even led to calls for a re-vote. On the night before the vote, German satirical magazine Titanic sent letters to FIFA representatives, offering gifts in exchange for their vote for Germany. Oceania delegate Charles Dempsey, who had been instructed to support South Africa, abstained, citing "intolerable pressure" on the eve of the vote.Had Dempsey voted as originally instructed, the vote would have resulted with a 12–12 tie, and FIFA president Sepp Blatter, who favoured the South African bid,would have had to cast the deciding vote.

Qualification

198 teams attempted to qualify for the 2006 World Cup.Germany, the host nation, was granted automatic qualification, with the remaining 31 finals places divided among the continental confederations. This was the first World Cup for which the title holders were not granted automatic qualification. Thirteen places were contested by UEFA teams (Europe), five by CAF teams (Africa), four by CONMEBOL teams (South America), four by AFC teams (Asia), and three by CONCACAF teams (North and Central America and Caribbean). The remaining two places were decided by playoffs between AFC and CONCACAF and between CONMEBOL and OFC (Oceania).

Eight nations qualified for the finals for the first time: Angola, Côte d'Ivoire, Czech Republic, Ghana, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Ukraine and Serbia & Montenegro. Czech Republic and Ukraine were making their first appearance as independent nations, but had previously been represented as part of Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union respectively; Serbia & Montenegro had competed as Yugoslavia in 1998, as well as making up part of Yugoslav teams from 1930 to 1990. For the first time since the 1982 World Cup, all six confederations were represented at the finals tournament.

Venues

Germany in 2006 had a plethora of football stadia which satisfied FIFA's minimum capacity of 40,000 for World Cup matches. The still-standing Olympiastadion in Munich (69,250) was not used even though FIFA's regulations allow one city to use two stadia; Düsseldorf's LTU Arena (51,500), Bremen's Weserstadion (43,000) and Mönchengladbach's Borussia-Park (46,249) were also unemployed during the tournament.

Twelve stadia were selected to host the World Cup matches. During the tournament, many of the stadia were known by different names, as FIFA prohibits sponsorship of stadia unless the stadium sponsors were also official FIFA sponsors.For example, the Allianz Arena in Munich was known during the competition as FIFA World Cup Stadium, Munich (or in German: FIFA WM-Stadion München), and even the letters of the company Allianz were removed or covered. These new names are reflected in the table in the brackets. Some of the stadia also had a lower capacity for the World Cup, as FIFA regulations ban standing room; nonetheless, this was accommodated as several stadiums had an UEFA 5-star ranking.