World Cup draw favours favourites

SOCCER / World Cup 2006: International football punditry was in crisis last night after the draw for next summer's World Cup finals tournament in Germany failed to produce "the group of death".

Of the eight top-seeded teams, Italy was perhaps the country to fare worst, Marcello Lippi's side being handed first-round games against Ghana, the US and the Czech Republic.

And Argentina drew the other most feared of the second-ranked European sides - Holland - along with the Ivory Coast and Serbia and Montenegro.

All of the favourites, however, look to have navigable passages to the knockout stages.

Brazil will kick off their defence of the title against Croatia in Berlin on June 13th, before moving on to Munich and Dortmund, where they will face Australia and a Japan side now managed by Zico. None of the games promises to be easy, but it is hard to imagine that the five-time winners will not progress to the last 16 of the competition.

Who might join the title favourites in the second round is much trickier to call. Croatia and Japan have performed well in recent tournaments, while Australia have some gifted players and, in Guus Hiddink, a particularly capable coach.

Confidence in the England camp, rarely low, will scarcely have been dented by last night's draw, with Sven Goran Eriksson's team being placed in the tournament's second group along with Paraguay, Trinidad and Tobago, and the manager's native land, Sweden.

The Swedes were quarter-finalists at Euro 2004 and performed solidly in their qualifying tournament for this World Cup. They also have an excellent record against the English. But both countries will fancy their chances against Paraguay, whose best showing at a finals tournament came in France in 1998 when they narrowly lost to the hosts in the second round, and the debutants, who are the third-lowest-ranked of the 32 finalists.

The two teams to progress from the group will then have to beat opponents from Germany's group if they are to reach the quarter-finals. Jurgen Klinsmann's men, of course, enjoy home advantage and, while we're at it, should never be written off. But this is not one of the country's better football teams, while their group, which also includes Costs Rica, Poland and Ecuador, could not be regarded as one of the tougher around.

In the circumstances, then, it was entirely unsurprising that the English media were swiftly casting an eye around for possible quarter-final opponents last night. In the event they do get that far, the opposition would come from the group headed either by Argentina or Mexico.

Germany's game against Poland in Dortmund on June 14th is one of a handful with special geographical, political or historical significance to have been thrown up by last night's draw.

The meeting between Argentina and the Netherlands in Frankfurt seven days later will be a repeat of the 1978 final in Buenos Aires, which the South Americans won 3-1.

First-time qualifiers Angola, meanwhile, will relish their opening fixture against Portugal in Cologne on June 11th. The Africans had been due to complete their pre-tournament preparations in Portugal; they may now be inclined to change their plans.

France and Switzerland, who between them ended Ireland's hopes of competing at the finals, were drawn against each other again in Group G, and will come face to face in the opening round of games, on June 13th in, of all places, Stuttgart.

With South Korea, semi-finalists on home turf four years ago, also in the group, it should a tough, three-way battle for two places in the second phase, although if all of his stars remain fit then Raymond Domenech's side should be able to make it safely through to the last 16.