Hosts aim to avoid embarrassment

There is an intriguing first-round quartet at the 2010 World Cup with Group A featuring France, Mexico, hosts South Africa and Uruguay.

South Africa will consider progress past the first round of the finals as real success as they seek to avoid setting a new low for World Cup hosts.

Virtually every other mini-league has an obvious candidate to finish first, and a couple of teams vying to be runners-up and also qualify for the

knockout phase of the most-watched global sports event.

Former world champions France, Uruguay and Mexico, who reached the second round at the past four World Cup tournaments, are among the top 20 football nations, but the hosts are always one of eight top seeds.

South Africa occupy position 90 – a record low for a host country - and only 2000-1 no-hopers North Korea among the 32-field are further down the rankings ahead of the June 11 to July 11 spectacular.