Canada will be front and centre when the Women's World Cup klcks off next summer after being drawn to face host Germany, the two-time defending champion.
The two will play June 26 in Berlin, the first of 32 scheduled matches.
The showcase match will feature two of the top stars in the women's game in Germany's Birgit Prinz, three-time FIFA World Player of the Year, and Canadian scoring machine Christine Sinclair.
African champion Nigeria and France form the other half of Group A. Canada plays No. 8 France on June 30 in Bochum and No. 27 Nigeria on July 5 in Dresden.
The top two teams in each of the four pools advance to the knockout quarter-final stage of the 16-team tournament, which runs through July 17 in nine German cities.
Canadian coach Carolina Morace was satisfied with Canada's draw.
"At this time, all games are difficult, but I don't think it's bad," the Italian native told The Canadian Press from Frankfurt, site of Monday's draw.
"The French, for now, are the weakest of the European teams. I prefer them over Norway or England or Sweden. And we don't know a lot about Nigeria. Just that they are physical. And in (the next) six months, we will scout them."
Morace did say she would have preferred not to play on Day 1.
"Because the first game in a tournament is always hard to play. But it's OK."
Germany is ranked second in the world, compared to No. 9 for Canada. Four years ago, the Germans retained the trophy without losing a match or conceding a goal.
The good news for Canada is that it had its best performance at the World Cup when it opened in the same group as Germany.
In 2003, Canada lost 4-1 to the Germans but won its other two first-round games and made it to the semifinals before losing 2-1 to eventual runner-up Sweden.
No. 5 Japan is the seeded team in Group B, along with No. 10 England, No. 22 Mexico and No. 23 New Zealand.
Group C is headed by the top-ranked U.S, with No. 32 Colombia, No. 6 North Korea and No. 4 Sweden.
Morace was still smarting Monday at FIFA's decision to base the seedings on world rankings rather than qualifying results. That elevated the Americans over CONCACAF champion Canada in the tournament pecking order.
"It's not right they were the first team in that group," she said.
Group D features third-ranked Brazil, No. 12 Australia, No. 62 Equatorial Guinea and No. 7 Norway.
Morace points to Group D as the most competitive in her opinion.
The winner of Canada's group will play the second-place team in Group B in the knockout quarter-final stage. The Group A runner-up will play the Group B winner.
The Canadian women have won six straight since a 5-0 friendly loss to Germany in September.
But Canada found itself behind early in that game in Dresden, conceding a penalty after two minutes. The Germans padded the lead with goals in the 54th, 74th, 76th and 82nd minutes.
"We didn't play badly against Germany," said Morace. "We made some individual mistakes and you can't make these mistakes at the international level."
Nigeria was unbeaten in winning the CAF title, defeating Equatorial Guinea 4-0 in the final.
The Super Falcons are a perennial powerhouse in Africa, winning the regional championship eight out of nine times. But they have failed to translate that success onto the World Cup stage, where they have advanced out of the group stage just once in five tries.
France went 11-0-1 in qualifying, winning all 10 of its matches in the group stage while outscoring the opposition 50-0. The French, who have benefited from a recent residency program, then beat Italy 3-2 (0-0 and 3-2) on aggregate to secure their place in the finals.
This is Morace's first World Cup as Canadian coach.
In 2007, a disappointing showing saw Canada fail to make it out of the first round with a 1-1-1 record.
The Canadians did not advance out of the first round in 1995 and 1999, and did not qualify for the inaugural tournament in 1991 when only one team came from CONCACAF.
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