World Cup Draw (6.12.13)

[redman41]

For those who are interested in finding out England's fate,live coverage of the Draw takes place on Sky Sports News @ 16.00 and on BBC 2 @ 16.30. Friday 6th December 2013.
England are not seeded so will meet at least one of these seeded Teams in the Group Stages !! Brazil(Host nation),Colombia, Argentina, Uruguay, Germany, Spain, Belgium and Switzerland.
Brazil is a huge Country so anyone playing in the Tropical region will definitely feel the heat in more ways than one !!
Come on England ! :-))

[VHG]

I was looking at the FIFA rankings of all the teams in the World Cup.

Funnily enough Brazil (ranked 10th) are the worst ranked team from all the seeded South American teams. That might partly be because they did not need to qualify so perhaps that has affected their rankings.

Argentina are FIFA ranked 3rd, Columbia 4th and Uruguay 6th

And of all the seeded teams only Belgium (ranked 11th) are ranked lower than Brazil.

Spain are ranked 1st and Germany 2nd with Switzerland 8th.

Also strangely Italy are FIFA ranked 7th and Holland 9th but neither of them are seeded but Belgium ranked 11th ARE seeded.

Portugal are ranked 5th but of course they had to take part in the play off for their World Cup place so were never going to be seeded.

[redman41]

It's rather farcical VHG as in my opinion the Seeded Teams should go by FIFA rankings. The Draw itself is complicated as well and will go on for ages, personally not sure if I fully understand what goes on !! lol

[VHG]

There is an interesting article here (see link below) about how they decide the FIFA rakings and World Cup seedings.

It is also interesting to note in that article that depending on WHO you play in friendlies could have a big impact on your FIFA ranking (and if you are seeded).

If you play say Germany or Spain in a friendly and beat them you get so many ranking points (and because those teams are ranked high the ranking points you get are quite good)

But if you play a very poor team in a friendly (even if you beat them) you get very few ranking points.

And if you don't get many ranking points in a match it takes you yearly AVERAGE ranking points down a bit, taking you further down the FIFA ranking table.

As it says in that article, if Holland HAD NOT played Indonesia in a friendly they WOULD have been one of the seeded team in the World Cup.

It also says if England had "managed" their friendlies better (make them unofficial friendlies) we could have been one of the seeded teams.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25134584

[redman41]

Thanks for the Link VHG, I liked this bit....
''Eduard Ranghiuc, who runs a football rankings website, has taken a keen interest in the subject. In April, the Romanian computer programmer wrote to the English FA and advised them to cancel their upcoming friendly games - or try to make these matches "unofficial" by making too many substitutes''
These Romanians are not daft are they !!!
Football is supposed to be a simple game but is complicated by idiots (Bill Shankly, quote )

[mightyWBA]

Finding out the "Group of Death" or "Grupo de la muerte" is one of the highlights for me,always makes me chuckle.
1958 World Cup the term was first used in Sweden when Brazil,England,USSR and Austria were drawn together.

The mysterious "Pot X",a draw, for a draw, for the draw adds spice to proceedings..Will Platini have made sure his hot balls favour France??
It's all great theatre.

[redman41]

Not long to go now, keeping my fingers crossed for England hoping they don't end up playing in Northern Brazil (Manaus, Recife, etc)

[mightyWBA]

Group of death it was then!
I see France got off lightly....