Football fever doesn’t get any more tangible than when watching South American teams — considered amongst the best in the world — battling it out on the field. The sheer passion and dedication of the supporters just blows away anyone with their victory chants and banners.

The South American Zone of the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualification pitted against each other nine national teams which form part of the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL). As Brazil will host the World Cup it automatically qualified to the tournament.

The South American qualifications featured the least amount of teams of all FIFA qualifying zones — but certainly some of the finest around. The teams competed in the qualifying process to earn the honour to be among the five national teams from South America that will play at the World Cup finals. The process took place in a single action-packed round where all CONMEBOL national teams played against each other twice on home-and-away fixtures.

Argentina led the pack, with Colombia, Chile and Ecuador closely tailing it and emerging as the top four teams in the qualifications. These four therefore proceeded automatically to take their place among the teams that will be delighting spectators worldwide at the finals.

Uruguay came in fifth place in the qualification and had to compete in an inter-confederation play-off against Jordan, the fifth-placed team from the Asian Football Confederation. This play-off was a two-legged knock-off with home and away matches that saw Uruguay beat Jordan to become the fifth South American team to pass to the finals.

Together with the host Brazil, the five winning teams make up the six teams from the South American qualification zone that will compete in the 2014 World Cup. These teams are all strong and fearful adversaries with a solid track record of football excellence behind them. Fans will surely be in for some entertaining matches and bettors will be getting a kick out of the high-stakes involved for all those  teams whose paths crosses these teams.