ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

1966 FIFA World Cup Qualification

The 1966 FIFA World Cup qualification was a series of tournaments organized by the five FIFA confederations to determine the participants in the finals held in England. A total of 72 teams from around the world participated, but some had their entries rejected due to various reasons such as non-payment of registration fees or failure to submit notifications on time.

In Africa and Asia/Oceania zone, South Africa was disqualified for its apartheid policy, while Australia failed to qualify despite being the only entrant in this region. The qualification process began with four national teams divided into two sections: Israel and Syria competed against each other as part of the European qualification, alongside 30 remaining European national teams.

In Europe, England had secured one of the automatic spots as the host nation, leaving nine free places to be contested by 32 teams. UEFA confederation qualified ten teams for the tournament, with five of them securing their spots through a league format used across all Confederations. The other four teams were selected based on tiebreakers.

In South America, Brazil was awarded one of the automatic spots as the defending champion, while three more teams competed to secure additional places. In North and Central America, nine teams participated in the qualification process, with some expressing interest but ultimately failing to qualify due to various reasons such as non-payment of registration fees or failure to submit notifications on time.

In total, 53 teams took part in the qualifying games, with a record number of participants for that year. The final tournament featured 16 teams, including England and Brazil, which secured their spots through automatic qualification.