The first-ever World Cup football tournament to be held on African soil gripped Sudanese fans of the sport from the moment the inaugural game between South Africa and Mexico kicked off in Johannesburg's Soccer City Stadium on 11 June. Legions of aficionados filed into neighbourhood cafes in Khartoum and bars in Juba each day to follow the action on television screens big and small.

The Big Tukul restaurant at the UNMIS compound in Juba became a nightly hangout for devotees of The Beautiful Game, some of whom festooned the thatched ceiling of the structure with the national flags of their favorite teams.

Sudanese staff members of UNMIS joined their international colleagues from other African countries in rooting for the continent's six entries from among the 32 nations that qualified for the tournament.

As the host team from South Africa and four other African squads successively crashed out during the first round of matches, it was left to Ghana to carry the hopes of an entire continent into the knockout stage of the world's biggest sporting event. The Black Stars' stirring 2-1 defeat of the United States on 26 June sent expectations soaring from Morocco to Mozambique, as Ghana became only the third African country in the history of the World Cup to reach the quarter-final stage. But the West African nation's dreams of reaching the final four ended on 2 July as the Black Stars came up short in an end-of-match penalty shootout against Uruguay.

The historic tournament ended on a fitting note as the Red Fury of Spain beat a determined Dutch team 1-0 on 11 July to win the World Cup for the first time ever.