FIFA World Cup Draw: Everything you need to know

CNN The FIFA men s World Cup is only played once every four years and it is arguably the most of eagerly anticipated event in all of sports The United States Canada and Mexico have known they will be co-hosting the tournament since but it s only as the draw comes into focus at the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC that it s going to start feeling real to fans all over the world An expanded -team competition up from will be different to anything we ve ever seen before and since the group stage draw is now upon us specific other storylines which have been bubbling underneath the surface will soon burst into view Who s playing And who isn t Of the teams involved have secured their place in the tournament Six more spots to soccer s greatest spectacle will be determined in a series of playoff matches next spring In the meantime they ll be drawn as placeholders European Playoff winner A B C D and FIFA Playoff winner and Argentina will return as the defending champion having comfortably topped its CONMEBOL qualifying group in South America The champion France who only lost the final on penalties also looks strong Defending European champion Spain is fancied to do well as is defeated European finalist England Morocco will be worth keeping an eye on by reaching the semifinal in it is Africa s the bulk thriving World Cup band ever The Atlas Lions totally dominated their qualifying group and could be destined to go even further next year Scotland Norway and Austria last played in the World Cup in and all three will be returning after an absence of almost three decades Haiti has qualified for the first time since There will be at least four first timers at this year s edition Jordan and Uzbekistan from Asia the tiny African island nation of Cape Verde and the even tinier Cura ao from the Caribbean with a population of about people the smallest ever nation to appear in a World Cup Further debutants like New Caledonia or Suriname could emerge from the intercontinental playoffs while Albania Kosovo and North Macedonia would be rookies if they could make it out of the European playoffs Shockingly Nigeria one of the African powerhouses failed to qualify And if the four-time champion Italy can t make it through the playoffs then the Azzurri will have failed to qualify for a third consecutive World Cup How will the draw work The teams will be drawn into groups of four teams Based on the latest FIFA rankings the teams have been arranged into four pots with each organization from Pot being drawn into one of the groups followed by each group from Pot being drawn into one of the groups and so on The three co-hosts are considered top seeds and so they will avoid Spain Argentina England France Portugal Netherlands Brazil Belgium and Germany Mexico A Canada B and USA D already know which groups they will be drawn into and they know the venues for their three group games There can only be two teams from European confederation UEFA in each group and no other confederation can have more than one group in a group Once the draw is complete the teams and their fans can map out promising routes to the final with a better sense of the host cities they might visit along the way What could the US draw look like With more than group stage scenarios accomplishable for every squad it s pointless trying to guess how the draw will play out But in theory the US men s national band USMNT could draw Australia the weakest unit on paper in Pot South Africa would be the quote-unquote easiest opponent in Pot avoiding tougher European or African opponents and world No New Zealand would be a plum draw from Pot Conversely a nightmare scenario could end in a draw against either Morocco or Croatia from Pot both of whom made the semifinals in and the Vatreni also featured in the final losing to France Norway is the heavyweight gang in Pot and a squad nobody would want to face particularly with prolific striker Erling Haaland starring for the gang and despite their ranking of world No Ghana from Pot could cause a sparse sleepless nights for the Americans The two teams have run into each other three times at the World Cup in the last years and the Black Stars beat the USMNT in and Who will be the biggest star The usual subjects are already lining up and two of them will make history Argentina s Lionel Messi will turn during the tournament and Cristiano Ronaldo will be by the time it kicks off despite their advancing years both are still on top of their tournament and will be appearing in a record sixth World Cup tournament Manchester City star Haaland s World Cup debut will be eagerly anticipated he scored more goals in qualifying than European teams and Lamine Yamal s debut could also be spectacular He s still only he s been smashing records ever since he burst onto the international scene as a -year-old in and he s already a European champion with Spain Keep an eye out for the French captain Kylian Mbapp too he ll only be and looking to play in his third consecutive World Cup final But perhaps the the majority visible figure at this tournament won t be featuring heavily on the pitch It might instead be the US president Donald Trump s presence President Donald Trump takes credit for securing the World Cup bid during his first presidency in and it s rarely been far from his mind since he returned to the Oval Office in January Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino seem to have become fast friends Infantino has been to the White House half a dozen times and he even accompanied Trump to Cairo for the signing of the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas Within weeks of Trump learning that he d been overlooked for the Nobel Peace Prize Infantino released that the global soccer governing body would be creating its own FIFA Peace Prize and awarding it for the first time at the draw Trump is widely expected to win the award even as he threatens Venezuela with war and last month noted he d be proud to bomb drug cartels operating in tournament co-host Mexico He s previously often referred to the other tournament co-host Canada as the st state Trump has attended numerous sporting events this year from the Super Bowl to the Ryder Cup the US Open men s tennis final and the Daytona He presented the Chelsea squad with FIFA s Club World Cup trophy in July and seemed reluctant to leave the stage as the players began to celebrate and he invited the Juventus company to the White House and solicited if a woman could make their gang Trump is using major sports events to keep himself in the spotlight and to further his own political agenda Expect him to be prominently involved in the tournament next year The politics Claims of human rights abuses plagued the previous hosts Russia and Qatar and now advocates for human and civil rights abuses have the United States in their crosshairs too Those advocates have raised the possibility of supposedly undocumented immigrants or visiting fans from abroad being detained and deported without due process Such fears could well deter chosen supporters from traveling to any of the games that will be played in the US cities That s assuming they can find an affordable ticket and secure a visa to movement the prices so far have been significantly higher than previous World Cups and the lengthy waiting times have forced the authorities to say they will fast-track the visa application process for fans hoping to attend As a likely foreshadowing the Iranian delegation including federation President Mehdi Taj reported it would boycott the draw because various of its key personnel were not granted visas before ultimately reversing its decision with an Iran Football Federation spokesperson telling Iranian state media Tasnim that head coach Amir Ghalenoei would attend as its technical representative Fans from nations caught up in Trump s excursion ban will also not be able to attend the games namely Iran and Haiti The draw should finalize the tournament bracket and the host venue for each encounter but as in the past few days as last month Trump was still musing on what it would take to move games from cities that he deems to be unsafe It s more likely that Trump is leveraging the World Cup to pressure mayors and governors in cities and states whose policies he doesn t like especially since FIFA has previously indicated it has ultimate say whether a host city is changed But fans thinking of spending thousands of dollars to journey to Boston Los Angeles or Seattle for example might think twice if they are concerned that the games will end up being played elsewhere