World Cup organizers say there was never an emergency plan to move the 2010 soccer tournament if South Africa were not ready.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter said the United States was among countries that could host at short notice. But World Cup organizer Danny Jordaan says the only way that could have happened was in the event of a natural disaster.

Jordaan says his country would never have agreed to invest $4.5 billion in infrastructure if soccer's governing body imposed any other contingencies.

"No country will sign that contract unless it is a secure contract," Jordaan said at a tourism conference in East London. "The organizing association has just one provision ... natural disaster destroying infrastructure to such an extent that the country cannot recover in time."

Mexico managed to host the 1986 World Cup just eight months after an earthquake killed about 10,000 people in the country, although the tournament was then just half the size of the 32-nation edition set for South Africa.

Concerns had been raised that South Africa would not be ready to host the competition after construction work on stadiums and transport infrastructure lagged behind schedule. A new rail line from Johannesburg's international airport to Pretoria has been curtailed and things were held up further this year by a construction workers' strike.

But Jordaan said he was never worried.

"Only an act of God that can move the World Cup away," Jordaan said. "God has been merciful, I suppose."

Jordaan said that South Africa had regularly proved itself capable of hosting international showpieces, starting with rugby's 1995 World Cup _ just a year after the country's first democratic elections. Continued...