England have been named as one of the eight seeded teams for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
The final draw will take place in Cape Town on Friday evening, where eight groups of four countries will be chosen to make up the first group stages of the finals.
The top two teams from each group will then progress into the knockout stages of the competition.
Fifa have set the seedings and pots to make sure no two teams from the same football confederation will play each other in the group stages. The exception is with European countries, but there will be no more than two European teams in one group.
England have recently slipped in the Fifa world rankings to ninth and many pundits thought this would mean they missed out on being seeded, especially as South Africa would also be one of the seeded teams. But the poor qualifying campaigns of Portugal and also France, who only qualified thanks to Thierry Henry's handball in their playoff against Ireland, meant that England were seeded ahead of these two.
Fifa have created four pots for the draw, with one team from each pot going into a group. The geographical restrictions mean that South Africa will not be drawn against any of the African teams in Pot three, while the two seeded South American teams will not be drawn against the South Americans in Pot three.
Joining England and South Africa in Pot one are Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Holland, Italy and Spain.
The other pots are made up as follows:
Pot 2 - Australia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Honduras, Mexico, USA, New Zealand
Pot 3 - Algeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay
Pot 4 - Denmark, France, Greece, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland.
The make-up of the pots means England could face a group with New Zealand, Nigeria and Slovakia, which they would probably feel confident about qualifying from. They could, however, end up in a group with USA, Cameroon and France, all of whom are in the top 20 of the Fifa rankings, that group would be a different proposition.
MSN 2/11/09
The final draw will take place in Cape Town on Friday evening, where eight groups of four countries will be chosen to make up the first group stages of the finals.
The top two teams from each group will then progress into the knockout stages of the competition.
Fifa have set the seedings and pots to make sure no two teams from the same football confederation will play each other in the group stages. The exception is with European countries, but there will be no more than two European teams in one group.
England have recently slipped in the Fifa world rankings to ninth and many pundits thought this would mean they missed out on being seeded, especially as South Africa would also be one of the seeded teams. But the poor qualifying campaigns of Portugal and also France, who only qualified thanks to Thierry Henry's handball in their playoff against Ireland, meant that England were seeded ahead of these two.
Fifa have created four pots for the draw, with one team from each pot going into a group. The geographical restrictions mean that South Africa will not be drawn against any of the African teams in Pot three, while the two seeded South American teams will not be drawn against the South Americans in Pot three.
Joining England and South Africa in Pot one are Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Holland, Italy and Spain.
The other pots are made up as follows:
Pot 2 - Australia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Honduras, Mexico, USA, New Zealand
Pot 3 - Algeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay
Pot 4 - Denmark, France, Greece, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland.
The make-up of the pots means England could face a group with New Zealand, Nigeria and Slovakia, which they would probably feel confident about qualifying from. They could, however, end up in a group with USA, Cameroon and France, all of whom are in the top 20 of the Fifa rankings, that group would be a different proposition.
MSN 2/11/09
