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This seem to be a strange mix of teams vying to kick out into the next round. We have Mexico as the most experience team with 12 previous appearances, the jinx team in Portugal who have not made it past the first round in the last 40 years, the last ranking team on the tournament — Angola, and an unpredictable but highly dangerous Iran.

Our gut instincts—Mexico

Mexico will remain steady throughout the entire group match given their exposure and experience. They are like the perennial playoff contenders that make it year after year. They may not be able to sweep this round and at the same time may lose a game against Portugal on the virtue of a collapse or lucky upset but would be enough to accomplish their second round expectations.

Portugal is the closest nightmare Mexico has; but in the end, they will be the bridesmaid that has graced the newspapers for so many years now. Luiz Felipe Scolari their Brazilian coach is the only hope Portugal has in making it to the next round.

Angola holding the lowest ranking record in the tournament will not have enough luck to reach the next round. Likewise, Iran, one of the underdogs will rely on Mehdi Mahdavikia being one of key players who played for German club football.

One of the toughest groups in the tournament boasting of teams Argentina ranked 4th and Netherlands 3rd in FIFA world rankings together with defensive specialist Serbia and Montenegro and Ivory Coast who relies on talent and enthusiasm will provide one of the most exciting group competitions in the World Cup.

Our gut instincts—Serbia and Montenegro

Argentina and Netherlands belong to higher rankings compared to Serbia and Montenegro and Ivory Coast; but it’s the suffocating defense of the Serbs that will matter the most in this tightly contested group.

Serbia and Montenegro have demonstrated to the world their impenetrable defense having conceding to one goal in 10 matches. Their defense coupled by the solid play of their Goalie reminds us of Germany and their Oliver Khan led finals appearance. As long as they keep their rivals check they should come away with a goal or two in every match to advance to the next round.

Argentina and Netherlands are expected though to have a solid run to emerge from this group and with Ivory Coast waiting in the wings for a possible upset.

The teams on this group are very much on the same level and each have the same chances of reaching the last 16 teams standing. England however may have a slight advantage coupled by the popularity of David Beckham. Sweden may be the silent assassin that could take any of these teams down until they realized they have moved to the next level.

Our gut instincts—Sweden

England may be everyone’s favorite but we on the other hand believe Sweden could take this through sound play, better preparation and deeper amount of focus and concentration being away from the media compared that to England. England’s recent woes on their coach could be a minor distraction that proves bigger at the level of the upcoming competition.

Paraguay and Trinidad and Tobago will be very good competitors considering their incremental development from the tough teams they had to face going into the World Cup.

Unless England comes together as insisted by Beckham; this won’t be a far enough campaign for this squad.

The World Cup grouping has already been finalized for quite sometime already.

But still, I thought of coming up with a picture that would show the killer draw for some, fair for others and wonderful for a selected few. The data is found below.

I have also put the current world rankings of each respective team having Brazil taking on center stage while Angola barely clinging on their hopes at number 62. England, Argentina, Czech Republic, France, Spain and the United States seem to be close behind.