Road to the 2010 FIFA World Cup: The Draw
 

Really guys? Really? After all the football/handegg talk a couple days ago I thought for sure someone would've been all over this well before me.

Well, either way, the draw is complete and we now get to speculate and wait 186 days for the first whistle. Here are the groups (pre-seeded team, FIFA ranking, SPI ranking):

Group A
South Africa(86, 65)
Mexico(15, 19)
Uruguay(19, 10)
France(7, 11)

Much of what I've read suggests this will be a cake-walk for the French, and by the time June arrives they could very well make it so, but if the matches began tomorrow this would probably look and feel a lot tougher for them. Nevertheless, I think this will still be an interesting group, if only because the South Africans will definitely try to play spoiler amongst three strong teams.

Group B
Argentina(8, 5)
Nigeria(22, 34)
South Korea(52, 42)
Greece(12, 33)

Argentina will probably come into this World Cup with guns blazing, which is bad news for everyone. The South Koreans are nearly eight years removed from their dream showing at home, and have fallen back some while the Greeks have only improved since winning the 2004 UEFA Euro Championship. Nigeria will try to exert themselves with a slight home support, but they'll be overmatched.

Group C
England(9, 3)
United States(14, 16)
Algeria(28, 46)
Slovenia(33, 37)

Calling the pre-draw anticipation in the US "guarded optimism" is pretty generous. Despite their global ranking and surprise success in the this past year's Confederations Cup (beating Spain and leading Brazil in the first half of the final 2-0), the mood leaned towards a scenario that the United States wouldn't get drawn in a favorable group. Well, they got the group they hoped for, now they have to hope for success. Meanwhile, England went on a tear in qualifying and will look to get their first Cup win in, well, too long.

Group D
Germany(6, 6)
Australia(21, 23)
Serbia(20, 13)
Ghana(37, 36)

Another interesting group. I'm pulling for the Aussies, frankly, who have seemingly made the best of their re-assignment to the Asian conference.

Group E
Holland(3, 4)
Denmark(26, 20)
Japan(43, 35)
Cameroon(11, 15)

It will be interesting to see what kind of role, if any, the Japanese and Shunsuke Nakamura play in this group. Otherwise, the Denmark-Holland match will be fascinating (especially for their fans) and probably the key to this group. The Dutch can't possibly screw this one up, can they?

Group F
Italy(4, 12)
Paraguay(30, 18)
New Zealand(77, 91)
Slovakia(34, 50)

Italy will have an easy start to their Cup defense and should coast through this group. This one will probably go as advertised.

Group G
Brazil(2, 1)
North Korea(84, 91)
Ivory Coast(16, 9)
Portugal(5, 7)

Here's your 2010 World Cup Group of Death. While Brazil and Portugal are powerhouses, the Ivorians will not be pushovers and they will have the "home" crowd on their side, all of which (plus the hapless North Koreans) make this group very fun to watch.

Group H
Spain(1, 2)
Switzerland(18, 31)
Honduras(38, 25)
Chile(17, 8)

After years of ruinous, tragic play, Spain finally broke out of their funk when they won last year's Euro. Then they lost to the United States in the Confed Cup this summer. Years ago that might've been considered a horrific turnaround, but this is Spain we're talking about. Regardless, they're looking to ride their recent success to a first-ever Cup championship.

Who the fuck invited New Zealand?

They invited themselves by virtue of winning a playoff against fifth-ranked AFC-contender Bahrain after roundly smashing their OFC opponents in the 2008 OFC Nations Cup.

Those opponents? New Caledonia, Fiji, and Vanuatu.

New Zealand to Australia: Thanks big bro!

Australia to New Zealand: You look like what happened when I wiped my ass on the Pacific Ocean.

Aw, too bad. I was hoping for a group USA, North Korea, South Korea, Iran :(

Japan haven't got a hope of getting out of the first round. The Dutch team have all decided they don't hate each other anymore and will coast into the next round. Denmark are a solid team and Cameroon one of the better African teams. Japan have a couple of decent players but no real team to speak of.

England too should walk into the second round but will undoubtedly manage to lose their first match, just to put everyone here on edge.

I think nobody made this thread as there's not that much to say about the draw and nobody who's even vaguely into football would bother talking about the World Cup until the far more interesting business of European domesic leagues and the Champions League have finished.

Like you wrote in your summaries - I'm interested in whether or not the US will carry their black horsed success from the confederation cup into the world cup, or simply prove themselves to be one hit wonders, and whether the African home teams will cause upsets in their own groups. I'm personally bored of Brazil nabbing the world cup every single time - Any world cup where Argentina or Brazil are knocked out during the first round is a good world cup to me.