No first seed team should want to avoid anyone Group of death: Australia Saudi Arabia Thailand North korea Yemen/India Group of life: Oman Palestine Afghanistan Bangaladesh Timor leste/Mongolia
Tricky group : Oman - Qatar -Turkmenistán - DPR Korea - Yemen Very easy group : Australia - Palestine - Afghanistan - Bangladesh -Cambodia
I think all the pressure is on the nations with pedigree at this level. They are expected to not just win their groups, but win convincingly, while those in pots 3 and 4 will probably approach this with a devil-may-care attitude. I certainly don't mind who Maldives face, in fact the stronger the group, the happier I'll be.
Pot 3-5 will be interesting, to see how they go against each other and also if they can be competitive against pot 1-2.
Group to avoid: Australia Jordan Vietnam Syria/North Korea India The Group I would want for ease is: Australia Lebanon/Palestine Myanmar Singapore East Timor/Mongolia
Group to avoid: Korea Republic* Qatar Afghanistan Korea DPR India Group I think will be relatively easy (with all due respect to the following teams): Korea Republic* Palestine Maldives Hong Kong Cambodia 1. Some of the lower ranked teams in my "Group to avoid" were considered based more on their past results/pattern against Korea Republic and/or logistical problems of facing that team in an away match. I think all teams in Pot 2 can be very tricky and dangerous to Korea in a qualifying stage (though I certainly hope and moderately believe that Korea will/has improved from 2011-13 qualification campaign). Just to name a few, Iraq, Kuwait, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia are dangerous teams. I've watched Bahrain during AC 2015 and they are not to be underestimated. Likewise, Lebanon and Qatar, even with the latter's disappointing Asian Cup results, have always managed to put Korea in difficult positions. Korea DPR seems to cause major headaches whenever Korea Republic meets them, and I picked India solely based on their results vs. Korea Rep in AC 2011 (sorry). Afghanistan seemed to pose serious logistical difficulties for away matches (or perhaps I'm not informed enough of their arrangements) and their relative unfamiliarity to Korea was considered. 2. As for the "Group I think will be relatively easy", I also based the list considering logistical difficulties (or easiness in this case) and other criterion rather than judging solely on expected skill of each team. I had to pick one team from Pot 2, a group I mentioned above as being seemingly very dangerous, and I had to pick Palestine. Not because I underestimate the talent level of this team, but because I think they are rather inexperienced as of now to play world cup qualifying matches against Pot 1 teams. Maldives and Hong Kong (pot 3 and 4 respectively) were considered because compared to other South-East Asian teams that primarily constitute pot 3/4, these two teams seemed to pose less hostile away match conditions. Past youth-level tournaments revealed how difficult away matches can be against teams like Vietnam, Indonesia, and Malaysia to name a few. These teams seemed to utilize rough pitch conditions and unfamiliar weather along with their intense supporters' atmosphere. As for Cambodia, this team was ranked quite low even within pot 5 (with all due respect). And I was tossing between Guam and Cambodia, as other teams in pot 5 such as Yemen, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan seemed to pose logistical problems for Korea Republic. Cambodia seems to be an easier opponent to face because depending on the date of the away match against these teams, Guam might have extreme weather conditions (something I hope Cambodia does not offer).
All above mentioned are simply minnows who are bugs to us Asian giants. In all honestly these teams are not a problem for Korea Republic and shouldn't be. Same goes for Iran, Japan and the Aussies. Sadly they have their own ways to rig themselves through games, so we need to deal with them wisely. I want Iraq in our group badly. I don't care about other teams, I want Iraq and I want that cocky Younis Mahmoud playing in Azadi Stadium in front of 100.000 Iranians. Back to the topic question, at the moment I rather have few teams which I'd love to see TM playing against. We haven't played against Japan and Australia for a decade or so, hope we face them soon.
It seems a shame that in a confederation with so few top teams that two of them haven't met in a competitive game since 1997 (when we weren't even in Asia). If we make the 3rd round I want to be drawn with Iran, not because I think they are easier than Japan or Korea, I think each team offers different but similar challenges, but because we haven't met yet.
I agree, I really want to see Iran face Iraq, although I'd rather them face off in the final group stage.
With friendlies set to be played next week there may be some shifting when it comes to World Cup Seeding. Most likely we're looking at this (assuming Yemen takes care of business in the return leg vs. Pakistan): Pot 1: Iran Japan Korea Republic Australia UAE Uzbekistan China PR Iraq (Most potential for movement is this spot with the top 5 in Pot 2 in pole position to grab it) Pot2 Oman Jordan Saudi Arabia Bahrain Qatar Kuwait Vietnam Maldives Pot3: Afghanistan Thailand Philippines Palestine Lebanon India Syria Tajikistan Pot4 Kyrgyzstan Timor-Leste Korea DPR Myanmar Turkmenistan Singapore Indonesia Yemen Pot5 Bhutan Malaysia Guam Bangladesh Hong Kong Laos Cambodia Chinese Taipei Ideal Group: UAE Maldives Palestine Timor-Leste Bhutan Group of Death: Japan Oman Palestine Korea DPR Malaysia
According to the predicted pots: Ideal Group: Iraq Maldives Tajikistan Timor-Leste Bhutan Group of Death: Iraq Oman Syria Korea DPR Malaysia
Ideal Group: UAE Kuwait Lebanon Turkemnistan Bangladesh Group of Death: Japan Qatar Lebanon Korea DPR Hong Kong
Damn right for "group of death"! First of all, Japan will qualify easily with 8W/7W1D/6W2D. Hong Kong will get ZERO point with big negative goal difference and become the worst 4 teams. That means they are out of the ACQ stage. Same story will happen if the other pot 5 teams in this group too. Also, the other three teams will have hard battles to fight for the 2nd place, and probably can't compete the best 4 runner-ups as they can draw all the matches with each other. It will be much worse if Hong Kong steals 1 point from any of them by parking the bus at home. A REAL GROUP OF DEATH - 4 out of 5 will die. IMO, the ideal group / group of survive should be: China Vietnam Philippines Singapore Malaysia/Hong Kong 1) Least travel distance. 2) The 5th placed team can survive in ACQ if they get 4~6 points in these 8 WCQ matches. 3) If the runner-up wins all the 3rd~5th teams at home and at least draw all of them away, then steal 1~3 points from the group winner, they have fair chance to become the four best runner-ups.
Not sure why Japan would be considered the team to avoid in pot 1 Australia and Korea are clearly better right now.
I don't know about others but personally I would still say Japan is better. If you are referring to Asian Cup results granted that UAE have been great but their win over Japan was pretty lucky, while similarly Iran has been victim of poor refereeing and also went out in penalties with a man down. These things happen in a cup competition but on a long-run qualifying campaign top teams will still be more consistent than the others, and Japan is no exception.
Not really I known those types of games dont have much meaning especially when theyre won over penalties. I just think they have been regressing for a while and arent at their 2010-2011 form. Im sure theyll be fine for the last round but with a new coach i dont think theyd be the team to avoid in the first round. Australia is inconsistent away so not them either id say Korea looks the best overall right now. I maybe would have said Iran but the whole queiroz situation will probably make for some bumpy moments in the first round but im sure theyll be fine by the final round there is just too much young talents for this team to not make the world cup.
Not really fussed. I think that we will be strong favorites to win our home games regardless of who we draw. I also think we can win away against all teams from pot 3 to 5. I think we will get around 19 points and that should be enough to win the group regardless of who we play ie I'm budgeting for one loss and 2 draws.
Surely the more interesting question is "who do we want to play" out of interest/travel opportunities. Looking at Pot 2 you'd probably love to get Vietnam/Maldives who seem to be a step back from the other six (who are all tricky in their own way), but also because they are much closer (and, I've sort of always wanted to go to Vietnam and this could give me an excuse). Also, assuming we are top seeds (and that AFC runs with the same draw structure for a 5-team group as last time), our first match will be at home, in Perth (that much is known) against the Pot 5 team. WHo would Perth like to get for their first Socceroos match in match in like forever. Could be Bhutan!! Personally, I'd love that just to be able to go to the match screaming "I am the serenest!!!!!"* at the top of my voice for 90 minutes. J * - sorry, it's an old reference.
I posted earlier in this thread that despite Asian Cup results, I think Qatar is a dangerous/tricky team to meet in a qualifying campaign. I think teams that have easier access to basic infrastructure (like airports, hotels, training site, airplane) can enhance their qualification results, which is a long-term/multi-match process, compared to in a short-term tournament where luck is more effective. This is not to insult or look down on many AFC member nations. I think we can't object to the fact that a number of AFC member nations cannot afford the best support system for their national teams multiple times over a long period of time. Not sure if I'm making a haste observation, but Qatar's victory over Algeria (at home) might show them regaining their form. And strictly as a Korean national team supporter, I want to avoid Qatar due to our hard time against them last WCQ. On a different string of thought mentioned on this thread above me, I do not think that Korea Republic is clearly better than other pot 1 teams. In my most unbiased (or pessimistic) voice, I would even say that Korea is weaker than AUS/JPN/IRN on most days, mostly due to our perceived lack of depth at many positions (and other persistent) problems.
For me personally Qatar is the team to avoid. They always cause trouble for Iraq. Somehow they managed to beat us twice in the 2010 WCQ (while we beat Australia and China ). But I'm glad we were drawn in Pot 1. I would rather face Qatar or Oman than Japan or Australia no matter what.