Along the streets of Germany's financial center, and one of the 12 venues for this year's World Cup, images of Ronaldhino, Zinedine Zidane and Freddie Ljungberg entice shoppers to buy shoes, T-shirts and more soccer products.

A shop assistant wearing an adidas soccer boot poses with a giant adidas soccer ball in a Munich sport store May 10, 2006. [Reuters]

The players, who wear equipment made by Nike, Adidas and Puma, respectively, are the public faces in a fierce fight for the money and loyalty of soccer fans worldwide. Ahead of the World Cup, with its estimated 3 million visitors and millions more watching the 64-game tournament live on television worldwide, the companies are working to ensure that when consumers think soccer, it's their company that comes to mind.

Adidas AG has the edge, given that it is an official FIFA sponsor, a role it has had since 1970, and looks to continue this year.

Matthew Lalin, executive vice president of the New York-based Steiner Sports Marketing, said that despite Adidas' role as a World Cup sponsor will guarantee it wide exposure, Nike and Puma are not about to be relegated to the bench.

"Call it guerrilla marketing or ambush marketing, they're going to ambush the hell out of this thing," he said by phone from his office in New Rochelle, New York.

Given the reach of the World Cup, companies who are official sponsors, and those that are not, are eager to reach billions of possible consumers.

Lalin said that even though Adidas has the official sponsorship from FIFA, neither Puma AG nor Beaverton, Oregon-based Nike Inc., will let the chance to pitch their products slip through the net.

"You get the content in the arenas and in the stadiums as an official sponsor, but we all know this is a star game. The World Cup is team oriented, but at the end of the day, who ever scores the winning that goal that's what's going to be on Sports Center," he said.

Which is why Puma, Nike and Adidas are focusing, almost in a precision way, on the teams they sponsor.

Nike counts defending champion Brazil among its roster, along with the United States, Portugal, the Netherlands, Mexico, Croatia, South Korea and Australia. For Nike, it's a big change, given that it only began making uniforms for teams for the 1998 World Cup in France.

And much like its marquee athletes, Nike is bringing the focus on to its World Cup stars, including Brazil's Ronaldhino and Ronaldo; England's Wayne Rooney and France's Thierry Henry.

Nike is also using the Web to tout its teams and players, along the more traditional methods of advertising. It has a Web site, www.joga.com, that it formed with Google that lets soccer fans form global networks in a virtual village inhabited by its trademark Swoosh and its players. There are even downloadable video podcasts featuring its star players.

Nike's soccer related revenue has increased from about US$40 million annually to now nearly US$1.5 billion, according to the company.

By focusing on the athletes, as well as the team, Nike, like Puma and Adidas, can reap more publicity, said Lalin, despite the World Cup being a team event.

"When Michael Jordan received his gold medal for basketball, he covered up the Reebok sign on the uniform with an American flag," he said of the Nike star and basketball legend. "That was an ultimate in your face."

It's also a way to shift focus on Nike, which has 30 percent of the world's athletic apparel market, at the expense of Adidas, which has 35 percent.

"I think the sneaker war and the apparel war has gotten ugly, but competition has gotten good for the industry," Lalin said.

Puma, which has only 9 percent of the global market, is the tailor of choice for Italy, Poland, Paraguay, the Czech Republic and Switzerland, as well as Angola, Ghana, Iran, Togo, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. England and Sweden use Umbro, while Ukraine and Serbia-Montenegro wear uniforms made by Lotto. Ecuador and Costa Rica use Marathon and Joma, respectively.

Herbert Hainer, chief executive of the Herzergonerauch-based Adidas AG, whose three-stripe logo is familiar to soccer fans, said this year's tournament is a chance for the company, which sealed a US$3.5 billion deal to acquire Massachusetts-based shoemaker Reebok, to expand its presence not just globally, but in its home market.

"The World Cup is definitely a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Adidas, because it's in Germany. Germany is, by far, our biggest market," he told The Associated Press. "This is a market where we have a market share which is more than double the size of our main competitor's."

The company is providing kits for numerous teams, blitzing its stores with World Cup-related advertising touting its long affiliation with the sport of soccer and its German heritage. Besides providing the kits for six teams, including host Germany and neighboring France, Adidas' name will be found inside the 12 stadiums that are hosting the event, unlike Puma or Nike.

The company has also outfitted Argentina, Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, as well as Japan.

"We will sell more than 1.5 million jerseys for the teams which we will outfit, and this altogether will bring us over the euro1 billion revenue mark," he said, adding that sales of its soccer balls designed for the tournament will likely surpass euro10 million.