Today in St. Petersburg will host the draw for the 2018 World Cup. All you need to know about the event – Soviet Sport

Today in St. Petersburg will be a preliminary draw for the World Cup 2018.
 

The event will begin at 18:00 Moscow time in the Konstantinovsky Palace of St. Petersburg – the former residence of the great princes of the Romanov dynasty.

It is expected that the ceremony will involve about 2,000 participants and guests of honor.

With the welcoming speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin and the head of FIFA Joseph Blatter.

The very toss hold FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke, who will assist the stars of world football: Rinat Das Ronaldo, Samuel Eto’o, Diego Forlan, Fabio Cannavaro, Oliver Bierhoff, Alexander Kerzhakov and others. The event will be televised in 170 countries.

The draw will affect five of the six world football confederations. An exception will be Asia, where the qualifying matches of the second round 2018 World Cup has already started.

At the beginning of the draw will be determined by a pair of play-offs between
 representatives of the four confederations (South America, Asia, CONCACAF and
 Oceania). In November 2017, they will determine the last participants
 the final stage of the Russian World Cup.

In Europe, the lot will distribute 52 teams (UEFA zone) on nine teams – six
 (Eight groups) and five teams (one group).

The Russian national team will be automatically qualified to the final of World Cup 2018 on a country-organizer of the competition, but it will be added to one of the groups, which perform outside of the competition (with a series of friendly matches).

Qualifying tournament in Europe will take place from 4 September 2016 to 10 October 2017. Groups will be drawn up on the basis of the July edition of the FIFA rankings.

At the preliminary draw for the African Zone will determine the pair teams in the first two qualifying rounds
 qualifying tournament in CONCACAF zone will be known pair of teams of the 3rd round, and in the
  area of ​​South America, where 10 teams traditionally participate in the round-robin tournament,
 It will be announced on its calendar. Oceania will be determined
 the groups of the second round.

Let us recall the World Cup 2018 in Russia will be held from June 14 to 15
 of July. Matches of the tournament will take Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kaliningrad,
  Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, Samara, Saransk, Volgograd, Rostov-on-Don,
 Sochi and Yekaterinburg. In the finals of the FIFA World Cup play, as before, the 32 national teams.

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