No more. Done. Finito. Acabou. The fight for the 32 golden spots to play the most exciting football (and sports) tournament on the planet has ended. Some big ones almost did not manage. And some return after 24 years.

Today was the day for the last 6 squads to qualify. The brave (or lucky?

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Cameroon and Nigeria have guaranteed a spot in the 2010 World Cup in South Africa today. Cameroon beat Morroco 2-0 (second goal by Eto'o) and Nigeria beat Kenya 3 2.

So far 26 countries are going to South Africa next June: Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Chile, Mexico, USA, Honduras, Netherlands, Spain, England, Germany, Denmark, Serbia, Italy, Slovakia, Switzerland, South Korea, North Korea, Japan, Australian, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Cameroon, New Zealand and South Africa.

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Going against what this writer wanted, New Zealand became the 24th nation with a ticket for South Africa by beating Bahrain at home. The only goal of the match was scored by Rory Fallon in the final moments of the first-half. The first-leg of this playoff ended 0-0, which gave Bahrain the chance of qualifying with a draw different from the nil one.

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The matches will be:

Ireland France
Portugal Bosnia
Greece Ukraine
Russia Slovenia

Photo via The Offside

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23 nations are in the World Cup. That leaves 9 spots. And by November 18th, we will know who is going to have fun next summer and who only be playing friendlies. 19 nations are still alive. They are:

New Zealand, Bahrain, Costa Rica, Uruguay, France, Ireland, Portugal, Greece, Slovenia, Russia, Bosnia, Ireland, Ukraine, Cameroon, Gabon, Tunisia, Nigeria, Algeria and Egypt.

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For 94 minutes, Costa Rica was on its third World Cup on a row. But the squad headed by Brazilian coach Rene Simoes provided another example of the saying "it's over when it's over." The USA team, who started 2 goals behind the visitors, tied in the stoppage time. The goal by Bornstein turned Honduras into the 23rd country to qualify for the World Cup.

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It wasn't the prettiest match in football history, nor was it supposed to be. Brazil had already qualified and Venezuela had almost no chances of qualifying (unless they beat Brazil 6-0 and Argentina beat Uruguay 9-0!), so it was what it was. Dunga did some experimenting and some things are definitely clear: Robinho should never come back, neither should Filipe Luiz, who plays anything but good football.

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Argentina is playing in South Africa. Maradona can breathe. The hermanos beat Uruguay 1 0 with a goal on the 84th minute by Bolatti. This ends Argentina's war to qualify, as they take the 4th and last spot for a South American country. Uruguay will now go to play-offs (against Honduras or El Salvador), standing in the 5th spot.

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There's nothing that can be demanded from Dunga and his players.

The team was already qualified, which turned the match against Bolivia into a open lab in the skies. The skies of La Paz took the reserve side of Brazil closer to hell than heaven. The 3600 meters above sea level suffocated the players.

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After the big round of this Saturday, more than half of the 32 spots are taken. Those going to the cup are:

Africa:
South Africa
Ghana
Ivory Cost

Asia:
Japan
North Korea
South Korea
Australia (weird, I know)

Europe:
Spain
Holland
Italy
Germany
England
Denmark
Serbia

North/Central America:
USA
Mexico

South America:
Brazil
Paraguay
Chile

And 28 nations still fight for the remaining 13 spots.

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The two surprises of the call for the last two games of the world cup qualifying are the return of defender Naldo and midfielder Alex, ex-Inter. I'm very pleased about the latter. It is also cool to see that Diego Souza from Palmeiras stayed. The list:

Goalies
Julio César (Inter de Milão)
Victor (Grêmio)

Side-backs
Maicon (Inter de Milão)
Daniel Alves (Barcelona)
André Santos (Fenerbahçe)
Filipe Luis (La Coruña)

Center-backs
Lucio (Inter de Milão)
Luisão (Benfica)
Juan (Roma)
Miranda (São Paulo)
Naldo (Werder Bremen)

Midfielders
Gilberto Silva (Panathinaikos)
Josué (Wolfsburg)
Lucas (Liverpool)
Kaká (Real Madrid)
Ramires (Benfica)
Elano (Galatasaray)
Sandro (Internacional)
Alex (Spartak Moscou)
Diego Souza (Palmeiras)

Forwards
Nilmar (Villarreal)
Adriano (Flamengo)
Luis Fabiano (Sevilla)
Diego Tardelli (Atlético-MG)

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With Brazil qualified to the World Cup, the match against Chile was going to be important for 2 reasons: 1)add another victory to the incredible sequence of 18 undefeated matches; 2) test new players to join the group of 23 going to South Africa.

For that, Brazil came with the following formation: Júlio César; Maicon, Luisão, Miranda, André Santos; Gilberto Silva, Felipe Melo, Daniel Alves, Júlio Baptista; Nilmar, Adriano.

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The day was busy. Many important matches going on at the same time and some countries can already rest assured to be visiting South Africa next June. The happy faces of the day? Paraguay, Spain and England.

Paraguay played in style and beat Argentina to give the hermanos more headache.

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With the suspension of Kaka, Lucio, Luis Fabiano and Ramires and the injury of Robinho, Dunga called for the match against Chile four players who play in Brazil it is important to remember that those playing overseas could not be called because of the rules that FIFA has. With that, Dunga called defender Andre Dias (Sao Paulo), midfielder Cleiton Xavier (Palmeiras) and forwards Diego Tardelli (Atletico-MG) and Diego Souza (Palmeiras).

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This Sunday, Ghana became the first African nation to get a ticket for South Africa. The qualification came after a 2-0 victory over Sudan with goals by Sulley Muntari and Michael Essien. The other nations already in the cup are Brazil, Holland, Australia, South Korea, North Korea, Japan and the hosts South Africa.

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More Soon.

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Surprises are the return of Adriano, who even fat is the top striker scorer of Campeonato Brasileiro, the return of Lucas, from Liverpool, and the new chance for left-back Filipe Luís. Miranda, the best defender in Brazil, was called one more time. Pato was left out again, a clear sign that Dunga is not happy with him after the striker's disappointing performances at the Olympics and the Confederations Cup.

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It seems everyone is paying tribute to the late Michael Jackson (sounds funny, this, hun?). Brazilian players decided to honor the king of pop with embarrassing goal celebrations. The worst?� The celebrations brought no luck.

Diego Tardelli, the striker from Atletico, tied the match against Barueri.

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I know the country is not the "miss congeniality", but how cool is that? Since 1966, when Portugal eliminated them with a 5-3, North Korea does not play a World Cup. Even cooler? South Korea will be there, forcing commentators to say "North" or "South" instead of just "Korea". The qualification came after a 0 draw with Saudi Arabia.

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Not the prettiest match ever seen, but goal achieved, I'll take the three points. Thank you very much. Brazil beat Paraguay yesterday 2-1 and is now securely placed on the first position of the South American qualifiers. Brazil now has the chance to qualify playing against Argentina, in Buenos Aires, on the 5th of September.

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On Wednesday evening Argentina will attempt to get over their recent altitude sickness with a World Cup 2010 qualifier away to Ecuador. Victory would� be a massive step towards ensuring� that Gabriel Heinze will be blighting the first African World Cup next year (injuries permitting of course), but after the debacle against Bolivia on the 1st April [. Click to continue reading...

33 years. This is how long it took for Brazil to defeat Uruguay at the Centenario stadium. The last time Brazil won there, Zico was having his debut with the yellow jersey. After that, people like Socrates, Careca, Muller, Romario, Ronaldo, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho Gaucho tried but did not win.

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Paraguay is currently in first place in CONMEBOL and ranked 17th in the latest FIFA rankings.

The Paraguayan national team is currenty atop the standings in CONMEBOL qualifying play.� The Guaranís have established themselves as a power in South America with successes both at the international and club levels.

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It was well over a decade the last time the Martín Palermo donned the Albiceleste. His infamous Copa América performance against Colombia in 1999.

Since that fateful day in Asunción, Palermo's career underwent a rollercoaster ride of unprecedented measures.� From the highs of his great game against Real Madrid to the day that he had a stand fall on top of his leg when he played for Villarreal.

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We head back to the club schedule this weekend, specifically in Europe.� However the performances of national teams cannot be ignored.� So much drama and so we're here to pick a Team Of The Week.� The TOW played matches and/or made headlines during the calendar week of March 26 - April 2. The winner is: Kingdom [. Click to continue reading...

The African continent was in full grip of World Cup qualifying fever as the opening round of matches in the final stage of qualifiers began.� In 2006 World Cup qualifying, Africa witnessed a changing of the guard with 4 new teams making their 1st appearance in The Great Tournament and according to the results from [. Click to continue reading...

This weekend's matches in Asia provided further proof that there is some high quality, dramatic football being played in Asia. The big, news making result from Asia this weekend came from Tehran where Iran gave up 2 goals in the last 12 minutes of the match to lose to Saudi Arabia 2-1 at Azadi Stadium. Click to continue reading...

CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying just got a lot more interesting after this weekend's matches. Trinidad & Tobago remained undefeated with a dramatic 1-1 draw versus Honduras in Port-Of-Spain.� The Soca Warriors battled Los Catrachos to a 0-0 score at half then Carlos Pavon put Honduras in front in the 50th minute. Click to continue reading...