What? :The event where the 32 teams that qualified for the 2014 football World Cup Finals are drawn into 8 groups of 4 for the group stage of the competition.
Where?: The upmarket coastal resort town of Costa do Sauipe in the province of Bahia, approximately 56 miles from the host city of Salvador.
When?: 1pm local, Friday 6th December 2013 (13:00 UTC/GMT -3 hours)
1am - Japan
3am - Sydney
8am - PST
10am - CST
11am - EST
4pm - Britain (GMT)
Duration: 90 minutes (the actually drawing wont likely take place until 45 minutes after the event starts)
Who?: 32 teams have qualified for the World Cup. They are as followed:
From Asia (AFC): Australia, Iran, Japan, South Korea
From Africa (CAF): Algeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria
From Europe (UEFA): Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, England, France, GErmany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Switzerland
From North and Central America (CONCACAF): Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico, United States
From South America (CONMEBOL): Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay
How does it work?:
The draw is seeded according to recent FIFA World Rankings.
The 32 teams are divided into 4 pots, predominantly based on their geographic location.
Pot 1: Contains the seeded team: The hosts, Brazil, and the 7 highest FIFA ranked qualified teams (Spain, Germany, Argentina, Colombia, Belgium, Uruguay and Switzerland)
Pot 2: Unseeded South American teams and the African qualifiers.
Pot 3: Asian, North and Central American teams.
Pot 4: Unseeded European teams.
A total of eight groups will be made up of one team from each pot. FIFA do this to maintain their principle of geographic seperation in the groups. No more than two European countries can be in any one group.
It can't be that simple right. This is FIFA we're talking about
Correct. At the moment Pot 2 only has 7 teams and Pot 4 has 9. Typically, in cases such as this, the lowest rank unseeded European team would be moved from Pot 4 to Pot 2. That team would be France. But due to Platini's influence (conspiracy theory!) an unseeded European team from Pot 4 will be picked at random to move to Pot 2 instead. It remains however that no more than two European teams can be drawn together in a group.
There is also a Pot X. The four South American seeds - Brazil, Uruguay, Colombia, Argentina - will be put into a temporary Pot 'X'. The three teams not drawn against this relocated European team in Pot 2 will go back into the main draw. This is so that no two South American teams are drawn together.
Breaking down the Pots - Highlight = Avoid Bold = Want
Pot 1: Brazil, Spain, Germany, Argentina, Colombia, Belgium, Uruguay, Switzerland
Pot 2: Ivory Coast, Ghana, Algeria, Nigeria, Cameroon, Chile, Ecuador, (and One Randomly Chosen Team from Pot4).
Pot 3: Japan, Iran, South Korea, Australia, United States, Mexico, Costa Rica, Honduras.
Pot 4: Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, England, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, France.
Lest we forget the brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
