Eleven bidders look set to vie for the right to host the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
Football's governing body FIFA will confirm Tuesday which candidates have formally registered for the contest.
The contenders, nine individual teams and a pair of two-country proposals, include Australia, England, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Qatar, Russia, the United States and South Korea, plus joint bids from Belgium-Netherlands and Spain-Portugal.
FIFA's 24-man executive committee will choose the two winning bids in December 2010.
Four of the bids come from FIFA's Asian confederation, two from the CONCACAF region of the Americas and five from Europe.
Because South Africa is hosting in 2010, African nations were eligible to bid only for the 2022 World Cup. None came forward.
South American countries were barred from joining either race because Brazil will host the 2014 tournament.
Five of the bidders have previously staged a World Cup: England in 1966; Mexico in 1970 and 1986; the United States in 1994; and South Korea and Japan as co-hosts in 2002.
(Xinhua News Agency March 18, 2009)
