The AFC Qualifying groups have been decided. Top two teams from each group advance automatically, and the two third-place teams play a two-leg playoff-- the winner faces CONCACAF's fourth placed team. Group A ------------- South Korea Saudi Arabia Uzbekistan Kuwait Group B ------------ Japan Iran Bahrain North Korea Personally, I think the grouping was very kind to South Korea-- which is good for us (CONCACAF). Looking at the groupings I think we'll see Guatemala versus Saudi Arabia.
It's hard to predict. Mexico and the United States are safe bets.Costa Rica who was outstanding in the last qualifying campaign,struggled a lot both in the first and second round of the qualifiers so I have my doubts about them... Now to the 3 underdogs!Out of the 3,Guatemala looks like the likeliest side to be a contender for the 4th spot(even the 3rd one).They did well in the second round to by finishing second of the "Group of Death" when most people predicted that they would end up at the bottom of it.I've checked their past results for 2004 and the results show that they are a capable team.They have a friendly match against Paraguay in January. As for Panama,some say that Panama is in the Hex because Jamaica couldn't deliver!However,let's not forget that Panama was able to upset Jamaica in Kingston 2-1 something that the other teams in the group couldn't do!Panama pretty much booked their ticket to the Hex on the last matchday with a 3-0 home win against El Salvador.The lost to the US(6-0) shows that the team isn't ready,but they are working on that!They recently traveled to Iran to play them at the Azadi stadium in Tehran.As expected,they lost but to my surprise,they only lost 1-0(It was Iran's second team) via a penalty kick from Ali Daei.I went on some Iranian Football websites(in english) to read a match report which mentionned that Panama played well(especially their goalkeeper) by having almost half of the ball posession in the match.Panama might be one of the weakest sides out of the 6 in the Hex,but at least,they are getting prepared for it!They will face both Denmark and Ecuador in January and February and the results from these two matches will tell if Panama can make it or not... And there is Trinidad & Tobago,a side who can produce good players and has players oversees but the result on the pitch are often not the ones expected.I remember in July reading that they faced South Korea in Seoul and was able to comeback after being a goal down and drawing 1-1 in the end.I was happy for the side and thought that their chances to qualify for Germany might be okay.But seeing that they played in a very weak group in round 2(except for Mexico),It saddens me,but I don't see how they can make it(with or without Dwight Yorke)!Most of their results haven't been convincing this year,losing by at least a 3 goal margin against teams like Northern Ireland and Scotland(who are not convincing in Euro WCQ themselves).Had this to the fact that some say that Jack Warner,president of CONCACAF was the one wanted to make sure that Trinidad & Tobago makes it to the Hex(being from Trinidad himself) don't know if it's true...Wheter it's true or not,T&T are not getting prepared for the Hex properly which they should as they faced way too much weak teams,and they haven't got a friendly(according to FIFA) before round 3 kicks off.Things don't look good in my view for T&T.That's just too bad as they have some good players...