AS one World Cup nears an end, another is being planned.

If the 2010 tournament should go to Africa, and South Africa in particular, a Tyneside businessman will probably have played a part in securing it.

Tim Cantle-Jones, 41, principal of Polar Productions, in Newcastle, has set his sights on winning the tournament for South Africa.

Mr Cantle-Jones, who sits on the board of development agency One NorthEast, has just been awarded a £170,000 grant from the UK Department of International Development to provide event safety training for more than 5,000 South Africans.

He said: "The training follows a major disaster last year when 43 people died during a football match.

"The country wants to be a real contender to host the World Cup in 2010, but needs to ensure its grounds are safe and secure for visiting teams and dignitaries from competing nations."

Mr Cantle-Jones' links with South Africa go back to 1992, when he went there to develop courses in sports administration, following similar work for local councils in the North-East.

After leaving Tynedale Council he established his own sports consultancy business.

He said: "One of the first contracts I won was to help visiting South Africans develop their systems for sports development.

"I brought over five South Africans initially, but eventually ended up training more than 120."

He went to South Africa in 1992 to develop courses in sports administration, and stayed until 1995.

"The highlight of that time was establishing the UK/South African Sports Institute," he said.

That led to Mr Cantle-Jones being presented with a Peace Maker award by Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

While he was there the country was welcomed back into the Olympic fold, and Mr Cantle-Jones was trackside at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992, when Elana Meyer won a silver medal in the 10,000m.

He said: "That was an amazing moment, and something the country had been working towards for ages.

"It was really emotional to be trackside when Elana crossed the line to take South Africa's first Olympic medal since the 1960s."

It was the Barcelona Olympics that also turned Mr Cantle-Jones on to the power of the big international event.

He said: "It was an amazing Olympics, really well organised, and it made me want to do something similar.

"I returned to the UK and started trying to get involved in major events in this country."

His first success was his involvement in the organisation of the Euro '96 football championships, which included games at Newcastle's St James Park, and an associated cultural festival known as EuroFest.

He said: "I was responsible for putting together a £500,000 cultural festival alongside the football tournament. It was also the Year of Visual Arts and made me start thinking about a possible bid for capital of culture status."

Mr Cantle-Jones is now a major player in Newcastle's bid for City of Culture in 2008.

He took over the culture brief for One NorthEast after Euro '96 and set about developing a better image of the region and Newcastle.