ARSENE WENGER claims England could win the World Cup but admits the Three Lions are not as good as France.
England will discover their opponents on Friday for next summer’s tournament in the United States, Mexico and Canada with the draw due to start at 5pm.
Former Arsenal boss Wenger, now FIFA’s chief of global football development, said: “England are one of the favourites of the World Cup.
“They are always nearly there. And they have to make the step. They have the quality to win.
“By trying to be as objective as possible, I think France are the super favourites. Just for one reason.
“They have more world-class strikers than any other country. To have such a bench and such quality will make the difference.”
France, who boast the likes of Kylian Mbappe, Hugo Ekitike, Ousmane Dembele, Desire Doue, Marcus Thuram and Randal Kolo Muani, are one of the top four seeds alongside England and the two countries cannot meet each other until the final.
American football legend Alexi Lalas, meanwhile, is hoping England will not win the World Cup.
During the tournament, on July 4, the States will celebrate its 250th year since gaining independence from Great Britain.
Lalas, who played 96 times for the States, said: “As an American here, it pains me to say this publicly but England are really good.
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“And they are coming over here next summer to the World Cup, on our 250th birthday.
“If it is coming home next summer on our shores, we cannot have that.
“We can absolutely not have that but they are very, very good.”
England manager Thomas Tuchel arrived on Thursday for the draw which should take about 90 minutes to complete.
The Three Lions won all eight group games without conceding and FA chief executive Mark Bullingham said: “Thomas has come in and really hit the ground running brilliantly.
“You can feel the brilliant energy in the camp and see that the players are really responding well to him.
“So we’re looking forward to the tournament.
“We know for European teams it’s obviously going to be hard in the heat, but we’ll do everything we can and we’re looking forward to it.
“In terms of logistics, it’s going to be a difficult tournament for every team.
“The distances involved, the climate changes, the altitude changes, just provide extra challenges.
But it’s the same for everybody and you’ve just got to take that and do what you can.”
Once the draw has been made, FA officials will scramble into action and try to plan the tournament.
At the moment, their favourite base would be in Kansas City while England will have a pre-tournament training camp at the home of Inter Miami in Florida.
Bullingham said: “We think we’ve got a really clear plan and we’ve mapped out obviously every eventuality depending on where we get drawn.
“We’ve got a plan, as every leading country will have, to acclimatise and to give ourselves the best chance.
“I think we’ve got a brilliant team that’s put together some brilliant base camps and we’ll be doing the same again and looking forward to the tournament.
“I think we’ve had some brilliant squads over the years.
“I think we’ve got a brilliant squad now and we’ll be in amongst the top teams.
“But there are some fantastic other teams there too.
“So of course we can’t control anything other than the fact we’ll be doing everything we can to do well.”
Wenger, meanwhile, also claims lessons will have been learned from the Club World Cup last summer which saw teams struggle in the baking heat.
He said: “We learnt a lot on how to better protect the teams.
“After the draw, on Saturday, we have the places where the games will be played and as well the timing of the games.
“We will consider a lot of the best possibilities for the teams to be protected from heat and as well for the players’ welfare we will have hydrating breaks during the game.
“There’s one uncertainty that we cannot master is the weather, especially in Miami, places like Atlanta where there were some problems. We will do the maximum to protect the competition and the players.”
