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ALL SET FOR EUROPE’S WORLD CUP PLAY-OFF DRAW

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With the release of the FIFA monthly ranking this Monday, all is now set for the draw for the play-off in Europe for additional four places in the 2018 World Cup.

Already, nine of the European places at the global event have been decided, remaining four to be filled.

The four are to emerge among the best eight runners up in the nine European groups. Slovakia, as the worst-ranked second-placed team, miss out.

The remaining eight are to be seeded according to their October ranking.

The best four will be put in Pot 1 while the others will be in Pot 2. Teams in the same pot will not clash.

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Based on the ranking released this Monday, Switzerland, Italy, Croatia and Denmark will be in Pot 1, while Northern Ireland, Sweden, Republic of Ireland and Greece will be in Pot 2.

The draw will hold this Tuesday at the Zurich headquarters of FIFA with Fernando Hierro carrying out the draw. The coaches of the eight teams are expected to be in attendance.

The order of the home and away legs will also be decided by the draw. This is determined as follows:

  1. One ball is taken from Pot 1 and one from Pot 2 and are placed in a central pot.
  2. The balls are then mixed and drawn one-by-one.
  3. The first ball drawn determines which team plays the first leg at home, and the second one decides who’ll host the return leg.

The first leg matches are to hold between November 9 and 12 while the return legs are slated for between November 12 and 14.

The team that scores the greater number of goals in both matches qualifies for Russia 2018. In the event of the teams being level on aggregate, the away goals rule will come into play.

If the winner is still not decided at the end of normal time in the second leg, the match will go to extra time with two periods of 15 minutes and the away goals rule still applied. If the scores are still level at the end of extra time, the tie will go to penalties.

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Kunle Solaja is the author of landmark books on sports and journalism as well as being a multiple award-winning journalist and editor of long standing. He is easily Nigeria’s foremost soccer diarist and Africa's most capped FIFA World Cup journalist, having attended all FIFA World Cup finals from Italia ’90 to Qatar 2022. He was honoured at the Qatar 2022 World Cup by FIFA and AIPS.

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