Here's an article I wrote up today and taped outside my cubicle at work now that all of the teams have qualified... The draw happens in 2 weeks!
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FIFA World Cup South Africa 2010 Group Draw
December 4, 2009, 10 AM Mountain
The actual draw method is still to be determined *(see below). If the draw follows 2006 method, most likely it will look something like this:
Pot 1 – Seeded Pot – Seeds based on world ranking in previous 3 years and performance in 2 previous World Cups
Pot 2 – Remaining 8 non-seeded European teams ensuring no 1 group contains more then 2 teams from Europe
Pots 3 and 4 - divide the remaining qualifiers from the CONCACAF (North America), CONMEBOL (South America), Africa, Asia, and Oceania regions
* Note the three CONEMBOL (South America) or CONCACAF (North America) teams could be in either pot, depending on how FIFA decide to organize the draw. Most likely, they will organize it according to the strength of teams in that region (with 3 being stronger then 4). Since the 5 Asia and Oceania teams are clearly the weakest, they will probably be assigned to Pot 4. Unfortunately, that means the determination for the other 3 teams in Pot 4 will be made between the 3 unseeded teams in CONEMBOL (South America) and 3 teams in CONCACAF (North America). Most likely, the 3 teams in CONEMBOL (South America) will be seeded in Pot 3 and the 3 in CONCACAF (North America) will be seeded in worst Pot, Pot 4.
Pot 1: South Africa, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Spain, England, France, Argentina
Pot 2: Portugal, Netherlands, Switzerland, Slovenia, Greece, Denmark, Serbia, Slovakia
Pot 3: Uruguay, Chile, Paraguay, Ghana, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Algeria
Pot 4: South Korea, Japan, Australia, North Korea, Mexico, USA, Honduras, New Zealand
Aaron’s Mock Draw
Group A – South Africa, Greece, Chile, Japan
Group B – Germany, Slovakia, Ghana, Honduras
Group C – Spain, Netherlands, Uruguay, New Zealand
Group D – Brazil, Slovenia, Nigeria, Mexico
Group E – Argentina, Portugal, Cameroon, North Korea
Group F – England, Denmark, Algeria, Australia
Group G – Italy, Switzerland, Ivory Coast, South Korea
Group H – France, Serbia, Paraguay, USA