Deputy manager at the Mbombela municipality and head of the provincial bidding team, Roelf Kotze, says a proper stadium in the city was long overdue.

"The stadium might be different to what a world cup soccer stadium would be," Mr Kotze said.

"All the hype and excitement about the world cup would be gone, and we'd sit down and re-plan."

He said Mpumalanga still had a good chance to host World Cup games after making a presentation to a 13-member FIFA technical team last Thursday.

Mpumalanga has proposed building a 40 000-seater stadium on a community-owned farm at Mataffin just outside Nelspruit at a cost of R335 million.

The Mdluli clan owns this prime piece of agricultural property after regaining ownership following a successful restitution land claim.

"We're quite confident after showing FIFA what we can offer. We were able to answer all their questions," Mr Kotze said.

The delegation also took a quick tour to inspect potential training venues such as KaNyamazane stadium near Nelspruit, KaBokweni stadium near White River and the Nelspruit rugby stadium.

They then flew to Mozambique and Swaziland, also to inspect potential training venues there since the two countries are merely an average of 100km from Mpumalanga.

Nelspruit is bidding against Kimberley in the Northern Cape, Polokwane in Limpopo and Port Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape to host the world's greatest soccer showpiece.

The 2010 matches will be played on eight stadia across South Africa, the first African country to host the soccer World Cup.

Source: AllAfrica.com