CAPE TOWN, South Africa — France will not be a seeded team for Friday's World Cup draw, meaning Les Bleus could face powerful teams such as Brazil or Spain in the group stage.

Host South Africa will be seeded in Group A and open the World Cup at Soccer City on June 11. The United States will be in a group with one of the seeded teams, a European team and a team from either Africa or South America.

The other seeded teams — based on a mixture of current FIFA rankings and historical World Cup results — are Brazil, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Argentina and England.

France won the World Cup in 1998 and was runner-up in 2006 but struggled to qualify for the 2010 event, prevailing in a contentious playoff against Ireland on a goal set up by Thierry Henry's hand ball in extra time.

FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke said France was a victim of its lackluster qualifying campaign since the seedings were based on the October rankings. Previously, past results in World Cups also had an impact.

In France, former national team coach Michel Hidalgo raised questions.

"I am asking myself if this is not a sanction for the hand ball of Henry," he told RTL radio. "It is an injustice. It looks like France is being sanctioned."

Valcke denied such speculation, insisting the seedings were based on technical criteria only. The French soccer federation gave a matter-of-fact account of the decision on its Web site.

Organizers will draw the eight groups from four pots set up in an attempt to balance groups.

The first pot will have the seeded teams, and the three others will be based on geography. Pot 2 will have the Asian and CONCACAF teams, Pot 3 will have to the five other teams from Africa and South America, and the last pot will have the eight remaining European teams.

The draw will also make sure that South Africa cannot play another African team in the first round. There are fears that the hosts might not make it past the first round, denting the chances of success for the first World Cup held in Africa.

Overall, FIFA decided it wanted to reward recent play more than past performances in the World Cup, hence its reliance on the latest ranking results.

"It is to recognize their qualifying campaign," Valcke said. "Holland had a great qualifying campaign (and) Spain is the first team having won all their matches."

The rankings were decided on the October standings and not the latest one from November to eliminate the advantage some teams might have had from additional games in the European playoffs.

In October, France was ninth, two places below England, the lowest seeded team. Had the November rankings been taken into account, France would have jumped ahead of England and Argentina.