Federation Internationale de Football Association World Cup draw: Northern Ireland to face Germany

The two national sides were drawn alongside each other in Group F of the European draw of the event’s qualifiers along with Malta, Lithuania, Slovenia and Slovakia.

Martin O’Neill believes the Republic of Ireland’s World Cup qualifying group is wide open after landing Wales as top seeds.

As well as that, Norway have shown potential in the last 12 months and will prove a tough nut to crack, while Azerbaijan and San Marino complete the group.

ESPN FC’s Mark Donaldson and Steve Nicol break down Scotland’s World Cup qualifying group, where they’ll meet an old frenemy in England.

“We will be looking to organise reciprocal matches with most of these teams during the World Cup qualification period so regardless of who comes “out of the hat”, England will have a balanced and competitive run of matches before the Russian Federation World Cup“.

Serbia beat Ireland in a Dublin friendly last year but are not the force they were and are bottom of their Euro 2016 qualifying group, albeit after a three point deduction arising from their controversial clash with Albania. The England-Scotland fixture, that is going to capture the imagination. England v Scotland fixtures go back a long, long way in history and there has been many a fierce encounter along the way.

The seeding system for the European qualifying competition will use Fifa’s current rankings which means although England and Wales will avoid each other and seven other top teams, there is the possibility of facing Italy or France.

“Austria and Wales and Serbia will be happy enough to be in the group”.

Hodgson said: “Regarding my own future, I am fully focused on preparing England for the Euros and – like the players – am determined to make an impact on the tournament”.

He added: “It is a very fierce rivalry and that’s good”.

“Both the games at Wembley and Celtic Park were played in a very competitive manner and were extremely intense, but there was certainly nothing untoward”, Hodgson added.

“We need to be careful before we start describing ourselves as overwhelming favourites”.

Whether Martin O’Neill is still in charge of the Irish team when the World Cup campaign begins in September of next year remains to be seen, although recent signals from the manager – and, indeed, his attendance in St Petersburg today – suggest that, barring a catastrophic end to the Euro campaign, an agreement will be reached with the FAI to extend his contract for a further two years.

And their manager Chris Coleman said tonight: “It’s a juicy draw”.

“I’ve just gone past one of the Germans and he said they were delighted were not playing the Republic of Ireland again”.

“There were a lot of teams in there you don’t really want, can do without that, and say some groups may have been better for us and some worse”.

” It is a great honour and privilege to be England manager – I honestly believe the team we are building has got a chance of doing relatively well in the future.”

“Serbia are on the rise as well and Austria, Moldova and Georgia is never easy”.