All thsis tuff about "three top 10 teams in the same group"...
The FIFA World Rankings are a load of crap.
http://www.soccerphile.com/soccerphile/news/fifa.html
those are the latest rankings and the way they are worked doesn't take in to account strength of opposition. The seedings that FIFA give are much more realistic in terms of how good a team is.
For example, if you think England should be ranked below America and Mexico then you need your head examined.
I'd say the top 10, in terms of actual ability looks something like this
Brazil
Argentina
England
Italy
Holland
Spain
Czech Republic
France
Portugal
Germany
And then after them you have teams like Sweden, Poland, USA, Mexico etc who I think are on a similar level. I presume Ivory Coast are up there as well, but I haven't seen them play.
THE USA's best chance is that the Czech Republic don't qualify; I say that because I can't see Baros scoring as many as he did in Euro 2004, and Koller is a waste of space. That said, you have to find a way to get the ball past Petr Cech.
For me Italy are as good as through, they are a far better drilled team this time round and Luca Toni could make himself into a star.
Ghana will be tough. very tough.