London warms up for victory parade

Although team officials have insisted that they are not looking beyond Saturday's final in France, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Service confirmed today that "preliminary work had begun on any possible victory or homecoming parade".

In 2003, England's players paraded the Webb Ellis Cup through the streets of central London in front of just over half a million people after winning the tournament in Australia.

However, with this year's World Cup attracting unprecedented public interest, police are braced for up to a million people this time should England defeat South Africa on Saturday.

World Cup organisers were also under increasing pressure to release the final remaining tickets for the final - which will be watched by about 16 million people on TV. Officials were set to make an announcement later today on how many seats will be available on the official World Cup site later this week.

England fans were waiting to discover this afternoon whether they were among the lucky few to win one of 1,000 seats allocated to the Rugby Football Union. Some supporters are paying up to £4,000 each for a ticket on websites such as eBay, as demand continues to outweigh supply.

Paul Vaughan, the RFU's director of business operations, said demand was far higher for tickets than for the tournament in 2003. "With France being so much more accessible to fans than Australia, the demand for tickets this time around has been phenomenal," he said.

An estimated 60,000 England fans are planning to descend on Paris to cheer on Jonny Wilkinson and his teammates at the Stade de France. The Paris Tourism Office confirmed today that the majority of the city's 75,000 hotel rooms are taken.

Anyone hoping to stay overnight are being advised to bring a tent to pitch up at the Bois De Boulogne campsite which is five miles outside of the city.

Hundreds of Parisians are also planning to open spare rooms and create a makeshift bed-and-breakfast service for English and South African fans.

Options for travelling to Paris have also narrowed as seats on the Eurostar, flights and ferries were immediately snapped up after England's semi final win against France at the weekend. Eurostar officials are predicting the busiest weekend in the service's 13-year history and have put on extra trains to try to cope with the demand. The UK's largest private jet charter operator, London Executive Aviation, said today that five of its jets - at £20,000 each - had been booked by fans.

Sales of replica England shirts have also shot through the roof. Perry Conway, 57, owner of Rugby Scene in Carnaby Street, says he is struggling to cope with demand. He said: "We are selling them to children and pensioners, corporate groups and City types."