The leader of South Africa's World Cup organising committee has warned England they will need to have Africa on their side if they are to survive the first round of voting to host the 2018 finals.

Danny Jordaan, the chief executive of the committee planning for next year's tournament, expects there to be a high-profile casualty when polling gets under way among the 24 members of the FIFA executive committee in December 2010 and has added his voice to that of CONCACAF federation chief Jack Warner to warn the England bid team against complacency.

Jordaan told several of this morning's newspapers: "The best team is not necessarily the winning team on match day.

"The difficulty will be in the first round. Where you have so many bidders, it is critical to survive the first round. It is very critical that England focus on the four votes of the African continent. That may very well take them through round one."

The Football Association have been working hard to become the preferred bid of Europe's governing body UEFA, while a joint Spain-Portugal bid would be likely to attract the South American vote.