Dataset of the Day: FIFA World Cup 2010 Final Draw

This summer, the FIFA Soccer World Cup will take place for the first time in an African country, South Africa. The Final Draw, the decider of which teams will be grouped together took place on December 4th. For many, this highly anticipated event officially kicks off the World Cup season. I am admittedly not much of a sports fan except for every four years when the geographer and traveler in me goes absolutely mad for the FIFA World Cup. Like many, I watch every game and savor the country to country battles over domination of their group and depending on where the games are taking place stay up late or wake up early to watch the elimination matches (remember 2002 in South Korea/Japan). The Would Cup statistics are perfect for making maps in Maker!. I have uploaded a bunch of different dataset in Finder! and have created some cool maps on World Cup 2010 as well as world cups of the past. This first map shows the world team rankings by points along with the groups chosen on December 4th. Each group contains one of the top rated teams. The other 3 teams in each group are randomly chosen but are kept as geographically separated as possible. Spain, also the European Cup champion, is #1 followed by Brazil and the Netherlands. Click on the map to see it in Maker! Although the next Women’s World Cup is not until 2011, I included a map of the women’s world team rankings by points. The USA is currently the #1 team followed by Germany and Brazil

Click on the map to see it in Maker!

As I mentioned, 2010 will be the first time the World Cup is hosted in an African Country. This next map shows the locations of past World Cups.

Click on the map to see it in Maker!

There have been 18 World Cup Games since 1930. From those games only six countries can call themselves the winners, with Brazil winning five times and Italy winning four including the most recent. Also, of the 193 countries that compete for FIFA only 75 countries have ever had the chance of playing in a Men’s World Cup Game. This next map shows the countries by the number of appearances made in a world cup game. The dots show the countries who have won by the number of wins.

Click on the map to see it in Maker!

Attending the games this summer in South Africa would be a once in a lifetime opportunity. If you are planing a trip for the games, knowing where the stadiums are located could be helpful in deciding on hotels and other details of your trip. This last map shows the locations of the World Cup 2010 stadiums in South Africa by their capacity.

Click on the map to see it in Maker! Enjoy the Maps…and the Games!! 176 days 16 hours 54 minutes and …..44 seconds to go! GOOOOAL!