The next England head coach will be asked to succeed where Steve McClaren failed so miserably after the national team, with almost eerie inevitability, were paired with Croatia last night in the qualifying draw for the 2010 World Cup finals in South Africa.

Only four days after they ended the nation’s hopes of competing in the European Championship finals in Austria and Switzerland next summer, Croatia will again provide the greatest obstacle to England reaching a leading tournament, although, given the trials and tribulations of the last qualifying campaign, McClaren’s successor will do well not to underestimate any of the team’s opponents in group six.

Brian Barwick, the Football Association chief executive, will step up his search for a new head coach once he returns next week from Durban, where the draw was held, and will soon have a fixture list - however gruelling and unattractive – to present to his candidates after a draw that placed England as second seeds behind Croatia and ahead of Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Andorra.

Barwick spoke of a “genuine responsibility to deliver this time” and he may have been pleased to hear that serious doubts were being cast about Rafael BenÍtez’s future at Liverpool yesterday, while José Mourinho remains available.

But whoever ends up filling the post, the chief executive said that there could ill afford to be any repeat of the qualifying campaign for Euro 2008, when Croatia followed up a 2-0 victory in Zagreb in October last year with a 3-2 win at Wembley last Wednesday, which sealed England’s fate.

“It’s an opportunity at competitive level to pit our wits against a team which did us twice in European qualification,” Barwick, who revealed that Sir Trevor Brooking, the FA director of coaching and development, will be consulted closely throughout the managerial search, said.

Representatives of each nation will gather in Zagreb during the final week of December to thrash out a match schedule, although Barwick will not be rushed into finding a replacement for McClaren by then – “it’s a hare-and-tortoise thing and we want to make sure we get the right person,” he said – even if he would ideally like one in place in time for the friendly with Switzerland at Wembley on February 6.

Michael Owen, the Newcastle United forward, served only to stoke Croatia fires yesterday when he said that none of their players would get into the England team, but for a man who masterminded home and away victories over supposedly more illustrious opponents, Slaven Bilic expressed disappointment that his team had again been drawn with England. “[When I saw the draw] I was saying, ‘Oh no!’ the Croatia coach said. “The only team I wanted to avoid was England. We are not afraid of them, but they have got a terrific team.”

Croatia may not be England’s biggest concern so much as the amount of travelling that they will have to do. The flight to Kazakhstan – the country sent up by Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen’s comic television creation – is about nine hours while Ukraine, quarter-finalists at the last World Cup, and Belarus promise to be tiring trips.

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