Germany and Italy have 4 ports? Will Hong Myung-bo face the death team of the North Korea-China World Cup
Sep 13, 2025
|
Fox Sports reported on the 13th (Korea time) that Germany, ranked ninth in the FIFA rankings, or Italy, ranked 11th, could be assigned to four ports.
The North Korea-China World Cup is the first competition to be held under 48 countries. The draw method is the same as before. 48 countries will be divided into 1 to 4 ports according to FIFA rankings, and a total of 12 groups will be formed into 1 group of 4 teams. One port of these will be assigned a top ranker and host country. The North Korea-China World Cup will be held jointly by three countries (USA, Canada, Mexico) for the first time in history, with nine remaining one port seats. The lottery will be held on December 6 in Washington, DC. In the end, the ranking, which is calculated by performance until the A-match in November, is expected to be the standard for the draw.
Port 1 is expected to include Argentina, the defending champion, as well as traditional powerhouses ranked 1st to 5th in the FIFA rankings, including Spain, France, England, and Brazil. Portugal, which ranks sixth in July's announcement rankings, the Netherlands and Belgium are also expected to include one port.
The problem is Germany, ranked 9th. Germany, which seemed to be riding in the first port without difficulty until the A-match in September, was beaten by Slovakia, which ranked 52nd in the FIFA rankings, in the European qualifying round for the World Cup. FIFA ranking is a system in which the top ranker wins against the bottom ranker, but if he loses, the score is greatly reduced. The defeat against Slovakia, which is 43 steps apart, is expected to be a fatal blow to Germany's failure to go to the first port.
Italy, ranked 11th, is also a problem. In the two consecutive games in September, they caught both lower rankers Estonia (126th) and Israel (75th), but they do not have much extra points. The announcement ranking in July had already dropped by two notches after being beaten by 33rd-ranked Norway in the June qualifying round. Italy will have four A-matches from October to November, but it will include the previous three teams and Moldova (154th). In other words, there is no opportunity to significantly increase the ranking point in order to enter the ninth place, which is the one-port Maginot line.
Even if the two teams failed to go to the 1st port, they could have entered the 2nd port, which is assigned to the next rank. However, if he fails to become No. 1 in the qualifying round and fails to win the ticket to the finals, he will go to the playoffs in March next year. FIFA has decided to draw the playoff finals after the draw by allocating them to four ports. This is why Germany and Italy, which lost to the weak in the previous qualifying round and it was not easy to rank first in the group, are mentioned as the possibility of being assigned to the four ports.
Until the 13th, Korea's FIFA ranking is 23rd, which can be positioned at two ports. If it was a previous tournament, it was a good position to aim for a good group formation. However, if Germany and Italy are included in the four ports and Mexico and the United States are included in the group, as expected by Fox Sports, there is a possibility that they will play the group stage in the Group of Death.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
