Capello's England go into tomorrow night's draw as one of the eight top seeds but the Italian insists he is unconcerned about who will end up in their group.

England are guaranteed to avoid the powerhouses of world football such as bookies' favourites Brazil, holders Italy and European champions Spain.

But France and Portugal are among the unseeded European teams who could end up in England's pool - as well as several tough African teams such as an Ivory Coast side boasting Didier Drogba and Barcelona's Yaya Toure.

Capello is just relishing the experience of being a manager at a World Cup.

He said: "It will be a great test, the hardest test of me as a manager.

"For me it's the first time I've breathed this atmosphere of the World Cup, the sensation. I can taste it. The airport, the people, the FIFA World Cup, Bafana Bafana, it's exciting.

"It's new for me. As a player it was different, because you think for you, now you have to think of more things, decide more things, check more things. The next five months will be really important to decide everything."

World Cup draws are infamous for throwing up a 'group of death' but Capello claims he is ready for that too.

Capello said: "No I don't worry about that [a 'group of death']. You have to play against all of the teams at some point, but of course if you play against the best teams it's not so easy to pass the first round.

"If we want to win you have to play against all of the teams. It is not important which team we have to play in the group."

The Italian believes an African side will make it to the semi-finals in South Africa next summer.

He added: "I think about the Africans and I believe this will be one of the most important World Cups for the African teams.

"I believe one of these countries will get to the last four.

"I saw the Ivory Coast play against Germany and they are a very strong team.

"They impressed me very much. The spirit of this team is to go forward, all the players are really good technically, and they surprised me because they play a lot of touches and they found the space to attack the space really fast.

"But it will be really important at the end of the season to see which players arrive fresh or fit. A player like Drogba is important."

Another, to England, is Rio Ferdinand and Capello insisted the Manchester United defender has plenty of time to shake off his nagging back problem.

"It's not a worry if he's not fit even in January," said Capello. "An Italian example is Alessandro Nesta who was injured for one year, now he's the best, and people are saying please come back into the national team.

"I cannot say he will be fit or not but I hope so - I hope the best England players will be fit."

Football Association chairman Lord Triesman predicted England "will sail through" the group stage if they keep to their qualifying campaign form.

In a rehearsal for the draw, England were drawn with Australia, Slovakia and Cameroon, which Capello would no doubt settle for.

England will have one European opponent and have a one-in-five chance of getting an African team - the other option from that pot is an unseeded South American side.

The fourth opponent will be from Asia, Oceania and north/central America with Mexico and the United States looking as though they are the teams to avoid.

But David Beckham, who will become the first Englishman to play at four World Cups if he appears for the national side next summer, echoed Capello's sentiments about not worrying who England end up with.

Beckham said: "It's always good to be seeded and be up there with the best teams in the world but in the World Cup it's not about staying away from certain teams.

"If you want to go all the way in the competition you have to come up against them at some point. You are going to have to beat the best teams and the best players so it doesn't really matter when you come up against them."

Pots for tomorrow's draw - eight groups of four countries to be drawn, each group containing one country from each pot:

Pot 1 (seeds)

South Africa, Brazil, Spain, Holland, Italy, Germany, Argentina, England.

Pot 2 (Asia, Oceania and North/Central America)

Japan, South Korea, North Korea, Australia, New Zealand, United States, Mexico, Honduras.

Pot 3 (Africa and South America)

Ivory Coast, Ghana, Cameroon, Nigeria, Algeria, Paraguay, Chile, Uruguay.

Pot 4 (Europe)

France, Portugal, Slovenia, Switzerland, Greece, Serbia, Denmark, Slovakia.