Confederations Cup 2013: and pairings are known

Spain will face Uruguay, Tahiti and the African champion in the first phase of the Confederations Cup, to be played in Brazil between 15 and the 30 of June, according to the raffle held at the Anhembí convention center in Sao Paulo. In the other group, the A, will be Brazil, Italy, Mexico and Japan. The ceremony featured the participation of the Brazilian model Adriana Lima, and the chef Álex Atala and the Brazilian president Dilma Rouseff was present, who stressed that his country has the obligation to “make a good organization”.

Jerome Valcke, FIFA secretary general, led the draw, who had a moment of confusion when assigning the numbers for Tahiti and Uruguay. Joseph blatter, FIFA president, highlighted that the tournament will have twelve stars, in reference to the world twists that the participating teams gather.

Spain will debut in group B on Saturday 16 June in Recife against Uruguay. The second game will be played in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday 20 against Tahiti and will close the first phase against the African champions in Fortaleza on Sunday 23.

The first two of each group will go to the semifinals and the final will be played at the Maracanã stadium.

In the draw were the selectors of the seven of the eight participating teams: Vicente del Bosque (Spain), Oscar Washington Tabárez (Uruguay), Cesar Prandelli (Italy), Alberto Zaccheroni (Japan), Eddy Etaeta (Tahiti), José Manuel de la Torre (Mexico) and Luiz Filipe Scolari (Brazil). The African representative will be the champion of the African Cup, whose final will be played next 10 February, at Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg.

The World Cup Cafú presented the tournament ball and there were musical performances by María Gadu, Arlindo Cruz and Meninos do Morumbí. Former world stars such as Bebeto or Ronaldo also participated..

The new ball will be named Cafusa, word that mixes carnival, soccer and samba.