A change in the rules has allowed the Football Association (FA) to bid to host the FIFA World Cup in 2018.

The FIFA executive committee has decided that the bidding system, which ensured a rotation of bids from one continent at a time, resulting in the World Cup being held at a different continent every four years, will be scrapped.

In its place, FIFA will introduce a system which allows bids from nations regardless of the continent they are in, as long as the continent has not hosted either of the two preceding competitions.

For the 2018 World Cup, this will mean that African and South American nations can not bid due to South Africa (2010) and Brazil (2014) being previous hosts.

The decision opens the door for European countries to bid for the competition, including England, which narrowly lost out to host the 2006 tournament.

The news was welcomed by both Prime Minister Gordon Brown and FA chair Brian Barwick.

PM Brown said: “I am delighted that FIFA has opened the door for the World Cup to come back to England. By 2018, it will be 52 years since England Hosted the competition.

With the Olympics in 2012, possibly the Commonwealth Games in 2014, the Rugby World Cup in 2015 and the Cricket World Cup in 2019, a Football World Cup in 2018 would crown what I believe can be the greatest decade ever for British sport.”

The government has chosen former sports minister Richard Caborn as a World Cup ambassador to work with the FA, DCMS and across government in an attempt to build a bid on the foundations of the successful bid for the 2012 Olympic Games.