2006 FIFA World Cup qualification

Summary of qualification

Confederation	Teams started	Teams that secured qualification	Teams that were eliminated	Total places in finals	Qualifying start date	Qualifying end date
AFC	39	4	36	4	19 November 2003	16 November 2005
CAF	51	5	46	5	10 October 2003	8 October 2005
CONCACAF	34	4	30	4	18 February 2004	16 November 2005
CONMEBOL	10	5	6	4	6 September 2003	20 November 2005
OFC	12	1	11	1	10 May 2004	16 November 2005
UEFA	51	14	38	14	18 August 2004	16 November 2005
Total	197+1	31+1	166	31+1	6 September 2003	16 November 2005

Tiebreakers

For FIFA World Cup qualifying stages using a league format, the method used for separating teams level on points is the same for all Confederations.The rules for separating teams level on points are decided by FIFA and can be found in article 18 part 6d to 6g of the FIFA Regulations 2006 World Cup Germany

If teams are even on points at the end of group play, the tied teams will be ranked by:

1. goal difference in all group matches
2. greater number of goals scored in all group matches
3. greater number of points obtained in matches between the tied teams
4. goal difference in matches between the tied teams
5. greater number of goals scored in matches between the tied teams
6. greater number of away goals scored in matches between the tied teams if only two teams are tied
7. single play-off at a neutral venue, with two 15-minutes periods of extra time and penalty shoot-out.

For FIFA World Cup qualifying stages using a home-and-away knockout format, the team that has the higher aggregate score over the two legs progresses to the next round. In the event that aggregate scores finish level, the away goals rule is applied, i.e. the team that scored more goals away from home over the two legs progresses. If away goals are also equal, then thirty minutes of extra time are played, divided into two fifteen-minutes halves. The away goals rule is again applied after extra time, i.e. if there are goals scored during extra time and the aggregate score is still level, the visiting team qualifies by virtue of more away goals scored. If no goals are scored during extra time, the tie is decided by penalty shoot-out.

This is a change from the 2002 FIFA World Cup, where total goal difference was the first tiebreaker.

A total of 194 teams played at least one qualifying match. A total of 847 qualifying matches were played, and 2464 goals were scored (an average of 2.91 per match).

AFC

44 Asian teams are affiliated with FIFA, but Cambodia, Philippines, Bhutan and Brunei decided not to take part, and Myanmar was banned from the competition, so a total of 39 teams took part, competing for 4.5 places in the World Cup.

The qualification was composed of three rounds.

• First Round: The 14 last ranked teams according to FIFA were paired 2-by-2 and played home-and-away knock-out matches.
• Second Round: The 7 winners joined the other 25 teams where those 32 teams were divided in 8 groups of four teams each. The teams in each group would play against each other home-and-away, and the team with most points in each group would advance to the Third Round.
• Third Round: The 8 remaining teams were divided in two groups of 4 teams each, that would again play against each other in a home-and-away basis. The two teams with most points in each group would qualify to the World Cup. The two third placed teams would play-off against each other home-and-away. Winner of this play-off would play against the fourth placed team in the Final Round of CONCACAF in an intercontinental play-off for a place in the World Cup.

Final positions (Third Round)

Main article: 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – AFC Third Round

Group 1	Group 2
Team Pld Pts  Saudi Arabia 6 14  South Korea 6 10  Uzbekistan 6 5  Kuwait 6 4	Team Pld Pts  Japan 6 15  Iran 6 13  Bahrain 6 4  North Korea 6 3

Play-off for 5th place (Fourth Round)

Main article: 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – AFC Fourth Round

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Uzbekistan	1–1 (a)	Bahrain	1–1	0–0

Bahrain advanced to the AFC–CONCACAF play-off on the away goals rule.

CAF

The qualification was composed of two Rounds. 9 teams entered the competition directly on the Second Round: the 5 teams that qualified for the 2002 World Cup Finals (Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, and Tunisia) and the 4 highest-ranking teams in the June 25, 2003 FIFA world rankings (Congo DR, Côte d'Ivoire, Egypt, and Morocco). The other 42 teams were paired 2-by-2 and played knock-out matches home-and-away. The 21 winners would advance to the Second Round.

In the Second Round, the 30 teams were divided in 5 groups of 6 teams each. Teams in each group would play against each other in a home-and-away basis. The team with most points in each group would qualify to the World Cup.

The competition also constituted the qualification competition for the 2006 African Nations Cup with the top three nations of each group qualifying (except for Egypt, which qualifies as the host nation, the fourth nation in Egypt's group qualifying in Egypt's place).

The African qualifying zone saw 4 out of 5 finals places going to World Cup debutants (Angola, Togo, Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana). Nigeria missed out on a fourth consecutive finals appearance while Cameroon did not reach their fifth consecutive finals.

The African zone also featured a group of death — Group 3, which brought together Africa's most frequent World Cup qualifier Cameroon with the two eventual finalists of the 2006 Africa Cup of Nations: Egypt and the Ivory Coast.

Final positions (Second Round)

Main article: 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – CAF Second Round

	Group 1	Group 2	Group 3
	Team Pld Pts  Togo 10 23  Senegal 10 21  Zambia 10 19  Congo 10 10  Mali 10 8  Liberia 10 4	Team Pld Pts  Ghana 10 21  DR Congo 10 16  South Africa 10 16  Burkina Faso 10 13  Cape Verde 10 10  Uganda 10 8	Team Pld Pts  Ivory Coast 10 22  Cameroon 10 21  Egypt 10 17  Libya 10 12  Sudan 10 6  Benin 10 5
	Group 4	Group 5
	Team Pld Pts  Angola 10 21  Nigeria 10 21  Zimbabwe 10 15  Gabon 10 10  Algeria 10 8  Rwanda 10 5	Team Pld Pts  Tunisia 10 21  Morocco 10 20  Guinea 10 17  Kenya 10 10  Botswana 10 9  Malawi 10 6

CONCACAF

The qualification process was divided in three stages. In the first stage, the 34 teams were divided in 10 groups of three teams each and two groups of two teams each. Groups with three teams had two rounds, with the best ranked team according to FIFA in each group entering the competition in the second round. In each group, teams were paired 2-by-2 and played home-and-away matches.

The 12 winners of the first stage advanced to the second stage, where they were divided into three groups of four teams each. Teams in each group would play against each other home-and-away, and the two teams with most points in each group would advance to the Final Round.

In the third stage, the six teams were put in a single group, and played against each other home-and-away. The three teams with most points qualified to the World Cup. The fourth placed team advanced to the AFC–CONCACAF play-off against the winner of a play-off between third placed teams in the Third Round of Asia.

Final positions (Fourth Round)

Main article: 2006 FIFA World Cup qualification – CONCACAF Fourth Round

Team Pld Pts  United States 10 22  Mexico 10 22  Costa Rica 10 16  Trinidad and Tobago 10 13  Guatemala 10 11  Panama 10 2

CONMEBOL

10 teams took part, all in a single group. The rules were very simple: the teams would play against each other in a home-and-away basis, with the four teams with most points qualifying to the 2006 FIFA World Cup. The fifth ranked team would have to play-off against the best team from Oceania, with the winner of this play-off also qualifying. For the first time, Brazil, the defending champion, was required to go through qualification and was not automatically qualified for the tournament.

Final positions

Team Pld Pts  Brazil 18 34  Argentina 18 34  Ecuador 18 28  Paraguay 18 28  Uruguay 18 25  Colombia 18 24  Chile 18 22  Venezuela 18 18  Peru 18 18  Bolivia 18 14

OFC

12 teams took part, competing for a place in the intercontinental play-off against the fifth-placed team from South America. The winner of this play-off qualified for the World Cup.

Final positions (Second Round)

Main article: 2004 OFC Nations Cup

In the Second round, the six teams were put in a single group, and played against each other once. The two teams with most points advanced to a play-off, and played against each other home and away. The winner of this play-off advanced to the intercontinental play-off.

Team Pld Pts  Australia 5 13  Solomon Islands 5 10  New Zealand 5 9  Fiji 5 4  Tahiti 5 4  Vanuatu 5 3

Final round

Australia and the Solomon Islands progressed to the final stage.

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Australia	9–1	Solomon Islands	7–0	2–1

UEFA

A total of 51 teams took part, divided in 8 groups (five groups of six teams each and three groups of seven teams each) competing for 13 places in the World Cup. Germany, the hosts, were already qualified, for a total of 14 European places in the tournament. The qualifying process started on 18 August 2004, over a month after the end of UEFA Euro 2004, and ended on 16 November 2005.

The teams in each group would play against each other in a home and away basis. The team with most points in each group would qualify to the World Cup. The runners up would be ranked. For the sake of fairness, in groups with seven teams, results against the seventh placed team were ignored. The two best ranked runners up would also qualify to the World Cup. The other six runners up were drawn into three home and away knock out matches, winners of those matches also qualifying.

Final positions (First Round)

Group 1	Group 2	Group 3	Group 4
Team Pld Pts  Netherlands 12 32  Czech Republic 12 27  Romania 12 25  Finland 12 16  Macedonia 12 9  Armenia 12 7  Andorra 12 5	Team Pld Pts  Ukraine 12 25  Turkey 12 23  Denmark 12 22  Greece 12 21  Albania 12 13  Georgia 12 10  Kazakhstan 12 1	Team Pld Pts  Portugal 12 30  Slovakia 12 23  Russia 12 23  Estonia 12 17  Latvia 12 15  Liechtenstein 12 8  Luxembourg 12 0	Team Pld Pts  France 10 20   Switzerland 10 18  Israel 10 18  Republic of Ireland 10 17  Cyprus 10 4  Faroe Islands 10 1
Group 5	Group 6	Group 7	Group 8
Team Pld Pts  Italy 10 23  Norway 10 18  Scotland 10 13  Slovenia 10 12  Belarus 10 10  Moldova 10 5	Team Pld Pts  England 10 25  Poland 10 24  Austria 10 15  Northern Ireland 10 9  Wales 10 8  Azerbaijan 10 3	Team Pld Pts  Serbia and Montenegro 10 22  Spain 10 20  Bosnia and Herzegovina 10 16  Belgium 10 12  Lithuania 10 10  San Marino 10 0	Team Pld Pts  Croatia 10 24  Sweden 10 24  Bulgaria 10 15  Hungary 10 14  Iceland 10 4  Malta 10 3

Play-offs

Sweden and Poland qualified directly to the World Cup. The other teams had to play off.

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Sweden	10	8	0	2	30	4	+26	24
Poland	10	8	0	2	27	9	+18	24
Czech Republic	10	7	0	3	23	11	+12	21
Spain	10	5	5	0	19	3	+16	20
Switzerland	10	4	6	0	18	7	+11	18
Norway	10	5	3	2	12	7	+5	18
Slovakia	10	4	5	1	17	7	+10	17
Turkey	10	4	5	1	13	9	+4	17

A draw was held on 14 October 2005 at FIFA headquarters in Zürich to pair each team from Pot 1 with a team from Pot 2. A second draw at the same time and location determined the order of the fixtures.

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Spain	6–2	Slovakia	5–1	1–1
Switzerland	4–4 (a)	Turkey	2–0	2–4
Norway	0–2	Czech Republic	0–1	0–1

CONCACAF v AFC

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Trinidad and Tobago	2–1	Bahrain	1–1	1–0

CONMEBOL v OFC

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Uruguay	1–1 (2–4 p)	Australia	1–0	0–1 (a.e.t.)