Ireland's World Cup draw: All you need to know

What's happening?

The Republic of Ireland are going to the World Cup, that's what.

Vera Pauw's team dug out a memorable 1-0 win against Scotland 10 days ago in their play-off showdown and that - coupled with Portugal's win over Iceland - sent them straight to the finals.

Had the higher-ranked Iceland beaten the Portuguese, Ireland would now be facing up to the prospect of the inter-confederation play-offs in New Zealand this February, but we no longer have to worry about the mind-bending permutations of a ridiculously convoluted qualifying system.

The Girls in Green are there - and on Saturday morning, they will learn who will be in their group at the tournament.

So who can they get?

Ireland will be in Pot 3, so there's a good chance they'll be paired with some big guns. The eight groups of four will be made up of one team from each of the four pots. The USA, Sweden, Germany, England, France and Spain lurk in pot one. They are the six highest ranked teams in the world.

Co-hosts Australia [13th in the world - Ireland beat them 3-2 in a friendly just over a year ago] and New Zealand [22nd in the world] are the other two teams. It's pretty obvious that New Zealand are the team everyone wants from Pot 1.

In Pot 2 we have Canada (7), Netherlands (8), Brazil (9), Japan (11), Norway (12), Italy (14), China (15) and South Korea (17).

Pot 4 is made up of Nigeria (45), Philippines (53), South Africa (54), Morocco (76), Zambia (81) and the three teams that come through the inter-confederation play-offs.

Good draw/bad draw?

The best-case scenario for Ireland would probably be New Zealand, South Korea and Zambia, or one of the weaker inter-confederation play-off winners.

Worst-case scenario? The USA, Brazil and Portugal, if they get through the