How Friday's World Cup draw will work

How Friday's World Cup draw will work

Published Dec. 5, 2013 2:09 p.m. ET

The draw to divide the 32 World Cup teams into eight groups of four is expected to take about 35 minutes. Here's a quick look at how it will work on Friday:

STEP 1: From the pot containing 9 European qualifiers, known as Pot 4, one team is picked at random. It is put in Pot 2, which has the 5 teams from Africa, plus Chile and Ecuador. This ensures that all 4 pots now have the same number of teams: 8.

STEP 2: The 8 teams in Pot 1 - containing host Brazil plus the top 7 seeded teams - are picked out one after another, starting with Brazil, and then divided into 8 groups, labeled A to H, with 1 team in each group.

STEP 3: One of the South American teams that was in Pot 1 - either Brazil, Argentina, Colombia or Uruguay - is designated at random.

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STEP 4: The European team in Pot 2 is now put into that South American team's group.

STEP 5: Pot 2 is emptied, with its 7 remaining teams picked out one after another and divided into the groups, with one in each group.

STEP 6: The 8 teams in Pot 3 are drawn and put into the groups.

STEP 7: The 8 teams in Pot 4 are drawn and put into the groups.

Groups A to H now all have 4 teams.

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