So somebody that understands these things better than me why would they put Qatar in pot 1. That is an immense distortion of where they should be. Doesn't that compromise the pot groupings and the reasons for having them in the first place? Putting Qatar in Pot 1 GUARANTEED that whatever group they were in would be weak group even before the groups were decided. Seems flawed to me. Is this just sucking up to the hosts giving them a potential chance?
I like to look at the groups in terms of cumulative ranking. I think an argument can be made that theres always substantial differentiation in difficulty of groups. For instance in Netherlands group they are 12th ranked, Senegal 22, Ecuador 45, and Qatar 51 (seems high, I expect them to look a lot worse)
So heres my primitive analysis. Add up the ranks of the clubs, highest cumulative number = weaker group. So that in Group A the score is 131, meaning a very weak group. In contrast Group E (tough group) is Spain, ranked 7th, Germany 12, Japan 23, and Costa Rica, assuming, at 31. This making a cumulative score of 73. So a difference in score cumulative ranking of 58 between GRoup E and A. Thats nuts. That means on AVERAGE that group E teams are 14.5 ranks better than Group A teams. In a 32 team tournament that disparity is like finding yourselves in a completely different level of competition