SPORTS EDGE

Football
N Korea target WC
Afp, Hong Kong
It may not please the purists, but North Korea's football team is firmly on course for the 2010 World Cup after reaching the last round of qualifying without losing or even conceding a goal.If they do make it, it will be the isolated communist state's first World Cup in 44 years and despite a lowly world ranking of 94, below such minnows as Gambia and Suriname.The endeavours also come at a time when the country, ruled with an iron fist by Kim Jong-Il, is believed to be suffering acute food shortages, reviving memories of a famine in the 1990s which left up to one million people dead.Better known for its nuclear weapons programme and dubious human rights record, North Korea, who play all in white, have hardly endeared themselves either with their defensive brand of football.Yet it appears to work.In the previous qualifying group North Korea scored only four goals in their three wins and three draws, but they kept a clean sheet every time thanks to a solid rearguard action that would make Italy look adventurous.With Brazil sitting uncomfortably in their qualifying group on the other side of the world and other end of the footballing spectrum, it raises the spectre of a World Cup with North Korea but without the five-time champions.