Brazil to host 2014 World Cup

Brazil have been formally appointed hosts of the 2014 World Cup and now face the daunting task of building or completely refurbishing every single one of their stadia for the tournament.

FIFA's inspection report has identified 18 grounds with more than 40,000 capacity that could host matches and these will be whittled down to nine or 10.

However, of the 18 four would have to be built from scratch and all of the other 14 undergo substantial renovation. FIFA inspectors said the Brazilian football federation had estimated £550million (1.1billion US dollars) as the budget for building and renewing the grounds but that figure appears very optimistic.

Blatter: tough task

Blatter said: "The task was not easy - for us it was a real big challenge to have the same list of requirements and the same conditions for only one candidate than if we had two and perhaps we put the bar higher than if we had two.

"There was an extraordinary presentation by the delegation and we witnessed that this World Cup will have such a big social and cultural impact in Brazil. This the country that has given to the world the best football and the best footballers, five times world champions, and if we don't stop the invasion of Brazilian footballers then in years to come we may have only Brazilians in all the national teams!

"That's why the executive committee has decided unananimously to give the right and the responsibility to organise the 2014 World Cup to Brazil."