The Draw for the 2022 World Cup

[redfiona99]

Normally, after a World Cup draw, I do an alternative "draw" based on purely on the national team rankings. For this World Cup, that is difficult, because 3 places have yet to be filled. Yes 3/32 teams (more than 10%) still haven't qualified but they've had the draw anyway.

Now obviously, a pure potluck draw doesn't have quite the same mathematical issues as mine (I did actually calculate the draw by rankings for all 18 possible permutations, and will add them slowly to the data-blog) but is there any need to have a draw this early?!