Why is it key for Mexico to avoid the repechage to improve its chances at the Qatar World Cup

The Mexican National Team faces the last three matches of the World Cup qualifier seeded in third place in the Octagonal Final of Concacaf and with the pass still at risk, especially if you want the direct ticket to Qatar 2022 and not play a repechage, as happened in Brazil 2014.

In addition to the tension that would mean playing the pass through an intercontinental repechage, which will again be against the representative of Oceania; starting from this World Cup in Qatar the rules in the distribution of pots change and whoever gets their ranking through a repechage will have more difficult rivals in their group of the World Cup.

For this added reason, the Tata Martino team will seek to avoid the risk of falling into the repechage zone, which is why he must win two wins in his last three matches of the tie and not depend on anyone to ensure his direct pass.

In the tragic event that Mexico is seeded in fourth place in the Octagonal Final and wins its place in the World Cup by defeating the representative of Oceania, it would be sent directly to pot 4 of the World Cup draw, along with the worst placed teams in the FIFA ranking and the other teams that won their ticket through a repechage.

For this reason, the teams that are in pot 4 will have a greater chance of falling into a group with difficult rivals during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

In previous editions it didn't matter at what stage the World Cup was won. During the draw, the national team was placed in one of four pots according to their place in the FIFA ranking, which is why Mexico was placed in pot 2 during the 2014 Brazil draw.

How do the drums and the World Cup draw work?

From Mexico 1986 to the Qatar World Cup, the tournament is formed with eight groups containing four teams drawn in each.

In order to avoid uneven groups, FIFA established the creation of four pots prior to the draw, where the 32 participating teams are sorted according to their classification in the FIFA ranking.

In such a way that each group of the World Cup has a team from each pot and thus the level is distributed as evenly as possible in the group stage.

For example, at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, the drums were defined as follows:

Pot 1 (seeded): Russia (hosts), Germany, Brazil, Portugal, Argentina, Belgium, Poland and France.

Pot 2: Spain, Peru, Switzerland, England, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay and Croatia.

Pot 3: Denmark, Iceland, Costa Rica, Sweden, Tunisia, Egypt, Senegal and Iran.

Pot 4: Serbia, Nigeria, Australia, Japan, Morocco, Panama, South Korea and Saudi Arabia.

Historically and thanks to its position in the FIFA ranking, Mexico has always been placed between pot 1 and 2 of the World Cup, so it tends to avoid at least one powerful opponent in the group stage, as it cannot be paired with teams of the same pot.

For the World Cup in Qatar, if Mexico gets its direct pass, it will be placed in pot two, along with teams such as Denmark, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Croatia, in the absence of the last qualifying rounds and the last FIFA ranking prior to the draw being announced on March 31.

For the first time, if the Mexican National Team were to fall in the repechage, it would automatically be placed in pot 4 and would be measured against any of the teams placed in pot 2, something that it could no longer avoid.

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