As was the case for the 2006 tournament, the sixteen teams have been split into four pools of four teams each. Whereas previously the teams played in round-robin competition in the first and second rounds, this time they will take part in a double-elimination format, meaning that teams are only guaranteed of playing two games. This change was made to eliminate the complicated tiebreaking procedures, which were required for one of the pools in each of the first and second rounds in 2006.