Quote Originally Posted by Loony BoB View Post
"This group has two big names, but this one doesn't" - they're all pulled out of hats in which they get into based on merit, last I checked. So I think that's pretty harsh to the teams that got in.
As far as I know, what they usually do is to put the top teams from the FIFA ranking into their own seperate group. Then all the other teams are drawn from a hat (although god knows that can't be cheated).

You do this to avoid having France, Italy, and Spain all being in the same group, of which a maximum of 2 can progress. You do this avoid having Finals-type games played out in the bloody primaries. As well as insuring that even if you are good enough to be there, the rules and luck in the draw determine whether you can or cannot.

That way you also avoid having a group of top-ranking teams like Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Denmark, Kazachstan, and Armenia. Where the top team (Montenegro) is 105th of the FIFA world ranking.