As the domestic and European club football competitions draw to a close, fans will be turning their attention to the forthcoming World Cup.

The World Cup begins on May 31 and lasts for a month.

Because the tournament is taking place on the other side of the world, in Japan and Korea, the internet will be key in helping fans keep up-to-date.

If you want to avoid being caught offside, the best place to start your World Cup campaign online is the Football Association's web site.

The site contains news, such as the announcement football is now the most popular women's sport, and features, such as a list of post-war England managers and their records, from Sir Walter Winterbottom to Sven Goran Eriksson.

There is a section devoted to all things England, from the team everyone will be cheering in the World Cup to news about the Women's Under 17s.

Although the site features photos and video clips, it has been well designed and loads relatively fast.

One of the FA's initiatives is to produce the world's biggest fans' flag, complete with one million supporters' names printed on it.

Visitors need to supply their email address, postcode and name but it means their support for the team will go all the way to the world cup.

Everyone who signs will be automatically entered into draw with the chance for two lucky fans to go to Japan, meet the team, visit the team camp and present the flag. Everyone else can content themselves by searching for friends and famous names who have signed up.

Looking further afield, unless you want to know more about FIFA president Sepp Blatter's vision for the international game, the organisation's various committees, or its doping regulations, it is probably best to avoid the main FIFA site and head for the official FIFA World Cup site, hosted by Yahoo, which contains masses of multimedia material about the tournament.

There is a section devoted to classic players, including Bobby Charlton, Maradona and Pele, and a guide to previous tournaments, including the 1982 finals when Italy survived the opening round on goal difference and went on to win the trophy for a third time, beating Brazil in the second phase.

There is also a featured team section, including an England team "still reviving the Spirit of '66."

The site encourages visitors to vote for greatest goal ever scored in previous tournaments.

Each week. Goal of the Century features ten goals, from which visitors are asked to select the top three. After six rounds of voting FIFA will announce the fans' choice of the best-ever goal.

The only problem is you will need a pretty powerful computer to make the best of this feature (the site recommends one with at least 128Mb of memory)

and a high-speed internet connection.

Visitors will also have to register with Yahoo before taking part in the selection process.

For a more irreverent point of view, fans can visit the Football365 site. It contains the usual news and transfer speculation found on most soccer sites and has a number of special features, which raise it above many other sites.

The Steve Anglesey column, described as "the 9th best football column on the internet", recently compared David Beckham's spending his rehabilitation period in an oxygen tent to a scene from ET.

Other sections feature the weirdest celebrity fans ever and excuses for skiving off during the World Cup.

www.the-fa.org
flag.thefa.com
www.fifa.com/index_E.htmlfifaworldcup.yahoo.com/en/
www.football365.com