England and Spain/Portugal have emerged as the bids with clearly the best technical reports among the quartet campaigning to host the 2018 tournament.

There is bad news for Russia however, who are designated a medium-level overall operational risk, and in particular a high risk for air transport.

That is the only 'high risk' designation for any of the European bidders although Holland/Belgium also suffer from being designated a medium-level overall legal risk due to issues with government guarantees.

The report, which has been seen by Press Association Sport, also looks to be highly damaging to Qatar's hopes of hosting the 2022 World Cup as the Middle East bid has been given the only 'high' overall operational risk rating among the nine bidders for the two tournaments.

England's report comes as a major boost to bid leaders after a month of setbacks following Sunday Times and BBC Panorama investigations into FIFA.

The report, which has been sent only to the 24 FIFA executive committee members who will vote on the hosts on December 2, splits the assessment into 15 categories - nine operational ones and six legal categories.

There are also two overall categories, one each for operational risk and legal risk, making a total of 17. This is how they break down:

:: England: two medium risk individual categories - stadium operations and accommodation - and 13 low risk, plus they are designated low risk in the two overall categories.

:: Spain/Portugal: also two medium risks individual categories: stadium operations and team facilities, and the rest are all low risk.

:: Russia: their plans come in for stronger criticism. Four categories - stadium construction, stadium operations, ground transport and accommodation - are all 'medium risk' but a high risk for air transport has caused an overall medium risk designation. Like England and Spain/Portugal, no issues have been raised about an overall legal risk.

:: Holland/Belgium: eight categories rated 'medium risk' with many of the same operational issues as their European rivals, but with problems over their government guarantees leading to an overall medium legal risk.

Russia bid leaders yesterday insisted all the issues flagged up by FIFA were already being addressed and would be solved well ahead of 2018.

Bid chief executive Alexei Sorokin said: "We have noted FIFA's assessment in this respect, which reflects the status quo. Sorokin said temporary airport terminals would be constructed plus 42 billion US dollars invested into airports."

Holland/Belgium bid chief executive Harry Been said the report was as he expected.

He said: "There were no surprises regarding the criticism we received - we had already accounted for this in our bid. Besides, there were so many positive comments that these overshadow any criticism."