Brazil face a two-year ban from international football - and possibly risk being thrown out of the 2002 World Cup - if their football federation (CFB) is found guilty of knowingly fielding over-age players in official competition.

In 1988 Mexico was given such a penalty for similar offences.

The president of the CFB, Ricardo Texeira, on October 29th demanded sanctions against the three players concerned. All three falsified their dates of birth in order to compete in competitions eligible for under-17s.

Sandro Hiroshi and Henrique, who play for Sao Paulo, and Bell, who plays for Botafogo, are the three players alleged to have submitted false dates of birth.

Hiroshi was a member of the Brazil team that won the under-17 Copa America in Paraguay in 1997 when in fact he was 18.

In 1995, Bell competed at the under-17 World Cup when he too was 18. Henrique almost did the same for this year's under-17 World Cup in New Zealand but was kept at home at the last minute for having "irregular papers".

The CBF is contesting the charge, laying all the blame on the individuals concerned. It claims the trio counterfeited licences, identity papers, passports, birth certificates and other official documents.

They plan to suspend the three players - possibly for life. Texeira said: "The justice tribunal could end their careers because what they did is a crime which may be punished."

The clubs involved also deny any wrong-doing, but the country's professional footballers are solid in their support of the trio and are threatening strike action if the three players are suspended.

The CBF has sent a dossier on the matter to FIFA. If it deems the Brazilian governing body culpable and follows the precedent set with Mexico it could then inflict a two-year ban on Brazil, thus leaving the four-time World champions unable to fulfil their qualifying fixtures for the 2002 tournament in Japan and South Korea.

Meanwhile, Japan has rejected an initial offer of 750,000 tickets from FIFA for the 2002 World Cup finals it will co-host with South Korea.

The offer, out of a total three million tickets, was made by FIFA at a meeting with the Japanese and South Korean organising committees ahead of Tuesday's preliminary draw in Tokyo for the 2002 event.

Yasuhiko Endo, secretary general of the Japanese organising committee, said a higher figure had been asked for. South Korea have been offered 750,000 tickets but have not complained about the allocation, Japanese reports said.

The Kyodo news agency said Japan would push FIFA for 250,000 more tickets.

FIFA said a record 197 of its 203 member countries had signed up for the draw to arrange region-by-region qualifying rounds for the first World Cup finals to be held in Asia.

North Korea is reported to have officially withdrawn from the draw despite South Korea's repeated offer to share with it some of the World Cup finals matches it will stage. The six absent countries are Afghanistan, Benin, Guinea-Bissau, Niger, North Korea and Papua New Guinea.

The number of participating countries tops the previous record high of 174 for the 1998 World Cup.