When Fifa announced earlier this month to a stunned world that tiny Qatar will host the 2022 football World Cup, it signalled the arrival of the Gulf era. Clearly the events in our region have climaxed and caused this titanic shift, changing stereotypes about the insignificance of our region.

Few may know that the game known to some as football and to others as soccer was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001. The nomination letter by Swedish politician Lars Gustafsson observed that sports - of which football was "the greatest sport of all" - play a valuable role in international relations by enhancing "the understanding between people of different races and religions in different countries."

For most Qataris, the world's most watched sporting event represents a chance to offer a new image of their homeland and the wider Middle East. "This is not just for Qatar, but for the whole region," Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned, wife of the country's ruler, told Reuters in an interview.

Every town in every country in Africa is home to at least one makeshift soccer field, the game is more than just a sport, it is part of daily life. In the lead up to the World Cup, photographers traveled from Egypt to Kenya, Nigeria to Ghana, capturing soccer lovers around the continent.

When Qatar was awarded the World Cup for 2022 it was viewed derisively in many Western capitals. Who was this small nation? Where was this country? Why Qatar? Even US President Barack Obama claimed afterwards, "The wrong decision was made."

For the second time in six months England have been left crushed by the World Cup. After the humiliation of this summer's 4-1 defeat to Germany in South Africa came another resounding rejection for football's mother country.

African governments and business communities hope that South Africa's success in hosting the 2010 World Cup will spur a massive increase in investment and private sector development for all of Africa.

Sony Professional has played a key role in making 3D World Cup games possible. Sony sets out to prove that an outside event can be covered in 3D at a reasonable cost.