the draw is bloody
The US was drawn into Group E this afternoon, along with Italy, Ghana and the Czech Republic. This is easily the most difficult group of the eight, with perhaps a nod to Group F which consists of Brazil, Croatia, Australia and Japan.

If you consider each team's current world ranking and sum them up for the four teams, Group E's total is the lowest at 72 with 50 of that accounted for by Ghana. The next lowest is Group F's 85 and then 3 groups in the mid-90s, 2 in the low 100s and Group G's total soaring to 126.

I'm not quite up for a full analysis of the group right now and there's plenty of time for that between now and June anyways. I will say that a small piece that fell in the US's favor is that they won't play their opening match until the 4th day of the tournament which will allow the players to settle in and observe how the games will be refereed. And of course there's the fact that it's impossible (not very difficult, impossible) to say what will happen once the games start being played. The US team will be in full control of their destiny. Provided they can keep key players healthy, the Americans are good enough to beat any team over the course of 90 minutes.

So for now, just brush up on your German.