30 September 2006
VIDEO: France 1-1 England

Hope Powell's side get just what they need from Rennes and make it to the promised land of the World Cup .

After an hour of dancing, singing and acrobatics, the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup draw, once it started, pitted England against reigning World and European champions Germany, as well as Japan and Argentina.

The immediate reaction of Head Coach Hope Powell was one of relief, after seeing Group B draw three of the world's top five together: USA, Sweden and North Korea.

Hope told TheFA.com: "It's typical that we've met Germany as we know each other's games inside out.

"You can never avoid one of the big seeded teams but all in all I'm pleased with the draw.

"At Euro 2005 our aim was to get out of the group stage and in the end, the line between succeeding and failing was very fine.

"We won a lot of fans at that tournament with our style of play and we'll be aiming once again to show people how far England have come.

"At the moment both Japan and Argentina are somewhat unknown quantities but we'll prepare diligently and make sure we do our homework on all the sides in the tournament."

The Draw (world rankings in brackets)

Group A

Group B

A1

Germany (2)

A2

Japan (9)

A3

England (12)

A4

Argentina (32)

B1

Nigeria (24)

B2

USA (1)

B3

Korea DPR (5)

B4

Sweden (4)

Group C

Group D

C1

Norway (3)

C2

Ghana (48)

C3

Australia (14)

C4

Canada (10)

D1

China (11)

D2

New Zealand (23)

D3

Brazil (8)

D4

Denmark (6)

Date

Opponents

Venue

Comp

KO

11 Sep 07

  Japan

Shanghai

WC

14 Sep 07

  Germany

Shanghai

WC

 

18 Sep 07

  Argentina

Chengdu

WC