Photos: Inside Fifa's World Cup IT operation

Centre of attention: A media circus greets the Brazil players on the pitch at the Allianz Arena in Munich. Doug Gardner, World Cup programme managing director at Avaya, says the network his company has created for Fifa will carry around 20 terabytes of data – much of that will be media content.

And the challenge is changing with every World Cup.

Gardner said: "Around 90 per cent of the photography at France '98 was wet film, shot with 35mm cameras," adding that the leg work was all done by runners relaying film cartridges from pitch side.

He said: "A lot has certainly changed," talking of the fact that legwork is now done by a vast network relaying pictures worldwide.

Even in Japan and Korea photographers often had to use mobiles or Ethernet connections at their hotel or the media centre to send images home. Now, thanks to wi-fi they needn't leave the pitch.

Gardner added: "Photographs now appear online within seconds thanks to wireless technology."

Also each stadium now boasts an international media centre. In 2002 there was just one for both host nations.

Photo credit: Will Sturgeon