First, I am assuming that the seeded teams are (aside from the host) only from Europe and South America. Okay, now what will happen in the scenario where Costa Rica and Bahrain each win their playoff match? Africa and Asia would each have 5 while CONCACAF would have 4 and CONMEBOL 2 (remember Brazil/Argentina are seeded). How would they possibly set up the pots for this? Generally they just "combine" federations (aside from Europe) to get 8 per pot based on whatever fits, but that is not possible because there is no combination you can come up with to create 2 pots of 8 while keeping all teams from the same continent in the same pot. So how would they do the draw if this were the situation?
They just create pots with more or less than 8 teams or "special pots" or place teams from the same confederation in different pots (of course they can't be drawn in the same group. For Example: Pot 1: Host, + 2 CONMEBOL +5 UEFA Pot 2: 8 UEFA Pot 3: 2 CONMEBOL + 5 CAF Special Pot: Strongest remaining team (Mexico or USA) Pot 4: 5 AFC+3 CONCACAF Special pot will be drawn with pot 3 but can't end up in a group with another CONCACAF team. Instead of a special pot, you just put USA/Mexico in pot 3. I would like to see this setup, because there would be a smaller chance for a group of death. But especially the UEFA pot will be unbalanced. Assuming Germany, Italy, England, Spain and France are seeded, we would have Russia, Netherlands and Portugal in there together with 5 more normal teams. One thing I don't like in my setup is, that the two unseeded CONMEBOL teams and the special pot team have a huge advantage, because they have a 33% to end up in South Africa's group. The team which do so is basically better off than every seeded team... But the CONMEBOL teams will be better off anyway (as long as they are paired with the CAF teams). Basically CONMEBOL has 3 seeded teams. So I hope they will use the special pot idea to ensure at least a team from another confederation can become "seeded" in SA's group. For the sake of even groups, I hope Russia/Netherlands/Portugal end up in the host's group.
This is how I see the pots being setup with Bahrain and Costa Rica losing. Seeds: * England (ENG) * Germany (GER) * Italy (ITA) * Netherlands (NED) * Argentina (ARG) * Brazil (BRA) * South Africa * Spain Pot 1 * Denmark (DEN) * Serbia (SRB) * Slovakia (SVK) * Switzerland (SUI) * Ireland-France * Portugal-Bosnia * Greece-Ukraine * Russia-Slovenia Pot 2 * Côte d'Ivoire (CIV) * Ghana (GHA) * Cameroon / Gabon * Tunsia / Nigeria * Algeria / Egypt * Honduras (HON) * Mexico (MEX) * USA (USA) Pot 3 * Chile (CHI) * Paraguay (PAR) * Costa Rica vs. Uruguay * Australia (AUS) * Japan (JPN) * Korea DPR (PRK) * Korea RepublicKorea Republic (KOR) * New Zealand vs. Bahrain Unless France wins then they get seeded and Holland goes into the UEFA pot.
CONMEBOL should be paired with CAF to ensure at least roughly equal pots. Of course it's a huge advantage for CONMEBOL, but better than a huge advantage for CONCACAF plus uneven pots.
They'd do something similar to what they did with Serbia last time, when there were 9 teams in the UEFA pot and they happened to get chosen (and put into the group of death). They'll put together a pot of nine--in the example you suggest, that would be either Asia + CONCACAF or Africa + CONCACAF. Then draw one out to go into the pot with the two CONMEBOL sides and the other confederation. After all--Serbia were NOT the lowest ranked team of the non-seeded UEFA teams last time. There's a precedent for using a blind draw and not rankings on this one.
Bump I'm cheering for this scenario to occur and hope FIFA bumps the US up into the African/South American Pot for the Draw due to FIFA rankings. (FIFA - Please don't do a random draw to determine which team moves up. And don't select Mexico)
I'd like to see: Pot 1: 8 seeds Pot 2: 8 Euro teams Pot 3: the rest. Draw groups for the 7 seeds (RSA gets A1) B1-H1 Draw the groups for drawing purposes. eg. CBFHGADE Draw teams from pot 2 in the above order. Draw teams from pot 3 in the above order with the first pass and the reverse order for the second pass ensuring that there are not two teams from the same confederation in the same group (Europe excepted) This method ensures a random mix of confederations and allows any two teams not in the same confederation to be matched.
Yes they were. Nov. 2005 FIFA rankings (UEFA WC participants only): 2. Czech Republic 3. Netherlands 5. France (seeded) 6. Spain (seeded) 9. England (seeded) 10. Portugal 12. Italy (seeded) 14. Sweden 16. Germany (seeded) 20. Croatia 23. Poland 36. Switzerland 40. Ukraine 47. Serbia and Montenegro
There are no 2nd or 3rd seeds. Pot 1 contains the 7 seeded teams + host, the rest of the teams are allocated based on geographical criteria.
It´s a bit odd that both Costa Rica and Uruguay, two countries who have been to several World Cups, are preparing to eliminate each other rather than playing New Zealand or Bahrain.
HONDURAS,TUNISIA,ALGERIA in pot 2 higher than CHILE,PARAGUAY,JAPAN,AUSTRALIA and SOUTH KOREA?that is a joke and FIFA rules so absurd!and look at pot 1 with eight UEFA team....SLOVAKIA,SWITZERLAND,BOSNIA,GREECE and might be SLOVENIA?but no matter what seeded and pot?the trophy will belong to power house:BRASIL,GERMANY,ITALY,ARGENTINA,ENGLAND,FRANCE and SPAIN,NETHERLAND,PORTUGAL!
Same as last time when the 2 much better teams of Uruguay and Australia battled it out for one spot while T&T and Bahrein got the other one. This time AFC have done what C-Caf did last time. Iran and Saudi, who would "usually" be considerred much better teams, lost out to Bahrein and North Korea - read Honduras and Guatemala losing out to T&T last time. In the end though we really are talking about teams 31 and 32 and it doesn't really matter where they come from. Uruguay may turn out different but if you finish 4th in C-Caf or 5th in AFC or just come from Oceania (post Australia) then you can't complain if you don't make it.
So now that New Zealand won, there are only 2 scenarios: 1. Uruguay wins. Likely will be 5 African teams and 3 South Americans in one Pot, and 3 North Americans, 4 Asians and 1 Oceanic in the other. 2. Costa Rica wins. Should be either: a: 5 Africans, 2 South Americans and 1 Oceanic in one Pot, and 4 North Americans and 4 Asians in the other. OR: b: 5 Africans, 2 South Americans and the best FIFA ranking of the remaining 9 teams get put into this pot (hopefully United States), the other 3 North Americans, 4 Asians and 1 Oceanic in the other pot.
It wont be 2b. They will be split by confederation. If they were splitting them by ranking they would do it for all teams and all 3 pots - at the very least for the 2 non Euro pots.
The only reason I can see 2b happening is from all the complaining FIFA will get if New Zealand is placed with the South American and African pot. 33% chance of getting Group A and avoiding 7 powerful teams in group play. IMO that's too much of an advantage for a team qualifying out of Oceania. We'll see what FIFA thinks.
But - that's more of an advantage for South Africa than for NZ. Home teams will get all advantages to get as easy a group as possible. Now that they've won, I think it's just about impossible for anything other than the 1st 2 options where everything is cleanly divided by federation.
We are all constantly complaining about FIFA rigging things to get the teams they want where they want them, and here you are saying they should deliberately rig the draw. Far more complaints will come if they do switch teams around IMO
FIFA is not worried about ease. This gives them even groupings. Plus this is another shot to give New Zealand in the South Africa bracket where the host can move on. In fact, they will have a 1 in 3 chance for that to happen with Chile and Paraguay if Costa Rica happens to win their round. I wonder if Chile and Paraguay realize they ought to be pulling for the other continent LOL!
well first they will draw for the south american seeded teams (argentina and brazil) from a noneuro pot that doesn't include the other south american teams which will begin with 16 teams (5 afc, 5 caf, 2 conmebol, and 4 concacaf). after this they will have 14 teams left. then they will draw from a pot for south africa's group that doesn't include another african team. after this they will have 13 teams left then they will draw for the euro seeded teams (5 teams) from the noneuro pot remaining teams. now they will have 8 teams left and this should essentially settle itself out because if there are any african or south american teams left then they will automatically be drawn to euro seeded groups that don't already have a south american or african team in them. and the rest of the groups that already have south american or african teams will draw from the rest of the afc and conmebol teams if there are any remaining.
The traditional Fifa draw technique would mean that if NZ get pulled out of the pot early, they would be placed in with a South American seed rather than going in Group A. So I think the chances would be lower than 33% for NZ, and higher than 33% for Chile and Paraguay. I will now spend the rest of Sunday trying to work out the actual %ages...
...OK, maybe it's not so hard. To be in Group A, NZ would need an African team to be first out of the pot 5/8 and another African team to be 2nd out of the pot 4/7 Those two african teams would be in with Brazil and Argentina. After that, NZ would have a 1/3 chance of coming out of the pot before Chile and Paraguay. 5/8 x 4/7 x 1/3 = 12% chance of NZ in Group A. Chile and Paraguay would each have 44%. I could be wrong