All set for World Cup draw
Allan Kelly
The World Cup will resonate to a distinctly African beat for the
first time here on Friday when the final draw is made for next year's
sporting spectacular.
Eighty years and 18 tournaments since the first World Cup was held in
Uruguay, when only 13 teams took part, none of them African, an African
nation will host the event for the first time with 32 countries vying
for the biggest prize in sport.
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FIFA President Joseph S.Blatter (C) greeting former Robben
Island prisoners who were part of the Makana football
association after a FIFA executive commitee meeting on
Robben Island in table bay off the coast of Cape Town. The
final draw for the 2010 World Cup took place yesterday in
Cape Town. AFP |
Commenting on the significance of the occasion, FIFA president Sepp
Blatter said: "This is a very important event for football and Africa as
the final draw comes to Cape Town where an unprecedented six teams from
the host continent will be represented.
"We expect a record global audience which I hope will be glued to
their screens for the duration of the show."
That show has taken a year of preparations to put together and
includes performances by Grammy award-winners Soweto Gospel Choir,
Beninese singer-songwriter Angelique Kidjo and one of South Africa's
favourite solo musicians, Johnny Clegg.
The grand finale will feature 80 artists including the
internationally acclaimed musical ensemble Africa Umoja.
African beats will echo throughout the show which will reach a
fitting climax at the moment when the 32 teams discover who they will be
playing and when during the June 11-July 11 tournament.
The guest presenter to assist FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke
make the draw at the Cape Town International Convention Centre will be
South Africa's Academy Award winner Charlize Theron.
They will be joined on stage by a line-up of sports celebrities,
including football star David Beckham, who is hugely popular in South
Africa, marathon champion Haile Gebrselassie, the first black player in
the South African cricket team, Makhaya Ntini, and John Smit, the
captain of rugby world champions South Africa.
Among dignitaries attending will be South African President Jacob
Zuma, Nobel Peace Prize winners Frederik W. de Klerk and Archbishop
Desmond Tutu, as well as former football icons such as Franz Beckenbauer,
Michel Platini, Eusebio and Roger Milla.
Former president Nelson Mandela, who played a leading role in winning
South Africa the right to host the World Cup seven years ago, will
address the audience by video message.
And then there will be most of the 32 coaches of the qualified teams
eager to learn what their opposition will be in six months' time when
the action gets underway in the month-long showpiece.
The draw itself sees the 32 teams divided into four pots of eight
from which the eight groups that will contest the first round will be
drawn.
The first pot will consist of hosts South Africa, and the seven
top-ranking world teams - holders Italy, five-times winners Brazil,
former champions Argentina, Germany and England and two teams yet to
hoist the World Cup in Spain and the Netherlands.
Pot 2 will have the four Asian qualifiers, the three from North and
Central America and rank outsiders New Zealand representing Oceania. Pot
3 sees the remaining five African sides grouped with the remaining three
South American, while the final pot consists of the remaining European
qualifiers.
Among the latter will be 1998 champions France and 2006
semi-finalists Portugal, and where they end up will likely go a long way
to designating the inevitable Group of Death.
It will all take 90 minutes and when it is over the talking will
begin. It is unlikely to stop until South Africa fittingly plays the
opening game of the first World Cup on African soil in Johannesburg on
June 11. CAPE TOWN, Friday AFP |
