FIFA announced today the the pots and seedings for the Olympics. Great Britain, Japan, and the US have been placed directly into, respectively, Groups E, F, and G. In addition the US is a pot with Canada and Brazil. So the US is guaranteed to not have Great Britain, Japan, Canada or Brazil in its group. Also, the venues for the US group games has already been determined by virtue of placing them in the G1 slot. Their first two games will be in Glasgow. Their final group game will be at Old Trafford, home of Manchester United. (That must be really a thrill for the team)
Wow, so there's a real possibility we might draw Sweden and North Korea again. Here's hoping not. At least there's no Nigeria this time around. It's not difficult to imagine an exact replica of 2011 WWC Group C. The odds of drawing Sweden are 50%, same for North Korea, and 33% for Colombia. I guess we'll find out tomorrow with our morning coffee...draw is scheduled for 6:00 am EST.
While Old Trafford may be great, for fans, going to Glasgow would be great. I've been in a lot of American cities and some of Europe's great cities, and Glasgow is fantastic from a "your average building" architecture perspective.
The U.S. Women's National Team will face France, Colombia and Korea DPR in Group G at the 2012 Olympics
Group E: Great Britain, Brazil, New Zealand, Cameroon Group F: Japan, Sweden, Canada, South Africa Group G: United States, France, North Korea, Colombia France on July 25th in Glasgow, Colombia on July 28th in Glasgow, and North Korea on July 31 in Manchester. Quarterfinals are August 3rd, semifinals August 6th, and the final August 9th. That's a game every three days. Pia will have to use her 18 players wisely to conserve energy (assuming we go far, that is). Top two teams from each group advance, plus the two best third place teams; 8 of 12 teams competing make it to the knock-out round, so that shouldn't be difficult. If Team USA finishes first, they'll play the third place team from either group E or F. If they finish second (it could happen with France around), they'll play the first place team from F, potentially our current nemesis Japan. If they collapse and finish third, they'd play the first place team from E, probably Brazil. If they somehow finish fourth, then well, it's time to go home.
A good point made in Jeff Carlisle's ESPN article on the draw: although the US is in the group with North Korea again, at least this time the US doesn't have to play them first, which always seemed a big disadvantage.
this new format is hard to read. and visually seems less inspired than i'd hope a new format would be...
I agree. As an 81 year old the small and lightface fonts are damn near impossible to read. I will probably stop using Big Soccer.
