Shiny New FIFA World Rankings
The all new, all singing, all dancing FIFA world rankings were revealed today. Sepp Blatter and co have given the system a bit of an overhaul after the World Cup confirmed the rankings were at odds with reality. The new criteria uses results from the last four years (instead of eight) and gives more weight to the importance of each match and the strength of opponent.
Here’s how the new top 20 looks (May 2006 ranking in brackets):
1 Brazil (1)
2 Italy (13)
3 Argentina (9)
4 France (8)
5 England (10)
6 Netherlands (3)
7 Spain (5)
8 Portugal (7)
9 Germany (19)
10 Czech Republic (2)
11 Nigeria (11)
12 Cameroon (15)
13 Switzerland (35)
14 Uruguay (22)
15 Ukraine (45)
16 USA (5)
17 Denmark (11)
18 Mexico (4)
19 Paraguay (33)
20 Côte d’Ivoire (32)
For complete rankings, click here. For a detailed explanation of the new system click here.
With the World Cup and the change in system, there’s been a bit of a shake up in the rankings. So who wins, who loses, and whose new ranking defies explanation?
Winners:
Big winner is obviously Italy who’ve jumped from 13th to 2nd, which seems a lot more accurate. Germany have jumped from a ridiculous 19th to a more respectable 9th. Ukraine and Switzerland (who should have been penalised for playing out the worst second round World Cup game in memory) both climb into the top 20. Equatorial Guinea climb an incredible 59 places to 95th. The only discernable reason for such a jump is their 1-0 win over Togo in the first leg of a preliminary World Cup qualifying game (Togo won the second leg 2-0). Brazil holds onto the best team in the world spot, despite looking anything but, while Ghana’s World Cup exploits see them climb 23 places to claim 25th. Ivory Coast are rewarded for that dramatic Group C win over Serbia & Montenegro, climbing 12 places to make the top 20.
They’ll be dancing in the streets of Pago Pago tonight. World Cup Blog favourites American Samoa are officially no longer the worst team in the world. They’re now in a nine way tie for that honour, which is preferable to being dead last.
Losers:
The new rankings haven’t been kind to CONCACAF. The USA have plummeted from 5th to 16th, which might hurt but they’re in no position to argue. Despite a decent World Cup, Mexico have dropped from 4th to 18th leaving them behind their big rival. They won’t be happy. The Czech Republic are back to reality with a bump, dropping from 2nd best to 10th best team in the world. South Korea drop 27 places to 56th (their 2002 semi-final appearance is now history under the new rankings), while Trinidad & Tobago’s World Cup debut wasn’t enough to stop them falling 17 places to 64th. As if things weren’t bad enough for San Marino, they’ve dropped 30 places to 191st, and spare a thought for Luxembourg who’ve fallen 42 places to 194th. Biggest fallers are Saudi Arabia, who drop a painful 47 places to 81st.
Hard To Explain:
Nigeria hold on to their spot as the 11th best team in the world, despite not qualifying for the World Cup. The only explanation is their consecutive third place finishes in the African Nations Cup in 2004 and 2006, but this still seems dubious. Cameroon, despite only making the African Nations Cup quarterfinals in 2004 and 2006, and not qualifying for this World Cup, climb 3 places to be ranked 12th in the world. Despite a World Cup semi-final appearance (and finishing second at Euro 2004) Portugal have fallen one place to 7th.
What do you think of the new rankings?
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Displaying the most recent 25 comments from a total of 78 comments.
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By Adam Rupolo | July 15th, 2006 at 7:23 am 
A lot of people are saying that some countries shouldnt be very high up such as Uruguay because they couldnt even qualify for the world cup. Its as if the logic for this is that they’re obviously not in the top 32 countries in the world. This would make sense except that due to world cup places in different continents, the world cup qualifying isnt gonna bring the best 32 countries in the world to the world cup.
For example, Uruguay ALMOST made the world cup but was in a tough South American league and lost the playoff to Australia (I think) But I’m sure and Fifa is sure that they would probably beat teams like Tunisia and Japan on an average day. See what I mean?
The ranking system is flawed obviously but the world cup cant be looked at as the only basis for a ranking system. A team may go farther in the competetion but just not be a good team for obvious reasons. For example can we put Ukraine at the same level as Argentina?
By FIFASTINKS | July 15th, 2006 at 7:17 pm fifa is garage now..their ranking system is evidence of that..not to mention the refs and fifa management were bias to a few teams …pretty much penalizing them for their diving tactics (which almost all soccer players do..lol)..if fifa wants to fix diving then they should just have the rule if your caught diving then you get a automatic red card…
Posted from 
Canada
By FIFASTINKS | July 15th, 2006 at 7:20 pm here is in my opinion the true fifa world rankings top 5
1.Italy
2.France
3.Germany
4.Portugal
5.Brazil
pretty simple…huh?
Posted from Canada
By Jonathan | July 15th, 2006 at 10:04 pm where is South Africa and we’re hosting the next world cup!!!!!!!!!
By Matthew | July 15th, 2006 at 10:14 pm I live in South Africa… but was very disappointed after watching the world cup because it was such a great tournament… a really great one, i mean damn good, well done Germany!! But what really disappointed me was that the hosts of the next cup, South Africa weren’t in it… its sad that the future hosts couldnt take part…
By Matthew | July 15th, 2006 at 10:18 pm My personal FIFA rankings:
1. South Africa
2. Chelsea FC
3. The Netherlands aka Holland
4. Espanol
5. Cameroon
P.S VIVA LA ITALIA!!!
By Jonathan | July 15th, 2006 at 10:28 pm Personaly matthes a bit cuckoo!!
My pesonal FIFA rankings!!
Italy
Brazil
France
Germany
Argentina
Portugal
Netherlands
By Matthew | July 15th, 2006 at 10:29 pm Just wana give a shout out to my mom, dad, Jonathan (Above my fisrt comment) and Natasha - I’m really sorry!!
This is so cool… yeah!!!
By Matthew | July 15th, 2006 at 10:30 pm Just wana give a shout out to my mom, dad, Jonathan (Above my first comment) and Natasha - I’m really sorry and… i love you!! LOL
This is so cool… yeah!!!
By Jonathan | July 15th, 2006 at 10:42 pm i personaly think that an African team can win the next world cup or at least go far.. Us Africans will beat drums and blow horns (vuvzela’s) and be behind or teams 110%
Viva la Africa
By Jonathan | July 15th, 2006 at 10:49 pm I personaly think i will be playing for South Africa for the 2010 world cup.. Hoza 2010!!!!!!!!
By Matthew | July 15th, 2006 at 10:54 pm The “vuvuzela” is a 100% South African horn… commonly used at soccer matches and the occasional rugby game… it can be purchased for about R20 (Rand - The South African Currency)… So to put it into tourist terms, about 4$ (Dollars). We hope you all buy your own personal vuvuzela (or as we call it - a vuvu) during the next world cup… and have great fun in the spirit of african and south african football!!!!
By Nathan | July 16th, 2006 at 6:58 am you know DANNY i think you could be rite. Martins is an exceptional player with good speed and an eye for goal. Nigeria and Australia is a match i would like to see.
Posted from 
Australia
By Penny | July 16th, 2006 at 8:39 am goddammit where’s australia!?
33rd is shit.
i hate the way FIFA works the rankings out…
Posted from Australia
By akanbi | July 18th, 2006 at 3:50 pm pls i want d new fifa ranking for 2006
Posted from 
Denmark
By Danny | July 18th, 2006 at 10:59 pm Yeah Nathan it would be a good match to watch but the likeliness of Nigeria playing Australia in the near future is highly unlikely.
By Danny | July 18th, 2006 at 11:00 pm Hey Nathan has Mark Viduka retired from international football yet or is he still contemplating his retirement?
By Carlos | July 21st, 2006 at 1:01 pm My personal FIFA Ranking:
1. Brazil (yes, despite their elimination in quarter finals, let’s not forget 5 championships)
2. Italy
3. Argentina
4. Germany
5. England
6. France
7. Portugal
8. Spain
9. Netherlands
10. United States
11. Uruguay
12. Ukraine
13. Denmark
14. Camerooon
15. Bulgaria
16. Czech Republic
17. Sweden
18. Switzerland
19. Paraguay
20. Ivory Coast
21. Colombia
22. Croatia
23. Korea Republic
24. Ecuador
25. Nigeria
26. Poland
27. Costa Rica
28. Ghana
29. Iran
30. Saudi Arabia
31. Russia
32. Japan
33. Romania
34. Ireland
35. Australia
36. Russia
37. Norway
38. Greece
39. Costa Rica
40. Finland
41. Hungary
Posted from 
Mexico
By Benficafiend | July 26th, 2006 at 5:18 pm I have to agree with anyone who ranks the top teams according to the top 4 in the most recent world cup. Why would FIFA disregard its own major tournament when it comes to rankings? This boggles my (probably too small) mind. After the top 4, almost anything goes, as far as the rankings are concerned. However, I am perpetually infuriated by people (like FIFA), who insist that England is a top 5 team in the world, and that England is “better” than Portugal. Every time these teams meet in competition, Portugal wins. Since 1966, when they lost, they have not lost to England in a competition. The same goes fro Spain and Holland, Portugal ALWAYS beats them. Yet somehow these teams are nearly always ranked higher. I don’t believe that mathematical formulas determine the rankings, I have never believed that. That’s why I picked Italy to win this World Cup the day they picked the groups, despite their Fifa ranking, and why I picked Germany to make the final (so I missed by one game). In fact, only France, of the 4 semifinalists, was not on my list (they still wouldn’t be there tomorrow, if they had to do it all again–I pick Brasil every time).
Viva Las Vegas!
Posted from 
Portugal
By Peter | July 31st, 2006 at 9:28 pm my only problem is portugal, they were 4th in the tourney and 2nd in the euro, b4 the tourney they were 7th and england was 10th, portugal beat england in the euros and in the worldcup, how is england all of a sudden 5th and portugal 8th, there is no way england should even be in the top ten, all there players are overrated ne way, they have no true star player like ronaldinho, or figo, or zidane… they have above avg players.
the ranking of the top 10 should go as folows
1.Italy(won the worldcup, cant argue, played like shit at euros thou, also no true star.)
2.Brazil(won confederations cup, played like shit in WC but if there bench played i still believe brazil could have won)
3.France
4.Argentina(should have won WC and came 2nd in confederations)
5.Portugal(4th at worlds, and best WC qualifying team with like 9 wins 3 draws and 30 goals for and like 4 or 5 against)
6. Germany
7.England(got lucky at WC with shit wins)
8.Spain
9.Holland
10.Mexico(should not have dropped so far, the made it to the round of 16 and lost to argentina in extra time)
Posted from Canada
By Nathan | August 3rd, 2006 at 9:38 pm hey DANNY i dont know if Mark Viduka has retired yet but it is highly unlikely that he will play 4 australia in 2010.
Posted from Australia
By Tom | August 17th, 2006 at 10:33 pm FIFA’s rankings are criminal! How can a team drop 4 places without playing a single game. The system is insanely biased in favour of the “established elite” of world football. I think this is insane both ethically and economically, as a total lack of respect (on FIFAs behalf) of emerging countries such as Australia and South Korea will marginalise a large population of new fans. Shame FIFA, shame!
Posted from Australia
By Simon | September 7th, 2006 at 3:55 am everyone must remember that the rankings are based on the last 4 YEARS not just a few matchs from the world cup and you can’t make your own judgements on teams that you wateched for only 2 or 3 games as their were a number of teams that played badly e.g - Brazil, England, France even Italy at times. There are other things that contribute to the rankings like -
Number of yellow and red cards
Number of goals scored/conseeded
Friendlies (Tho don’t count as much as competative matches)
So over 4 years the rankings do reflect quite well and well established teams are still at the top for a reason, they have all one a major trophy and consistently beat opposition below or at about the same level as them. Picking up on “Portugal always beating england and italy” - just becuase you can beat those teams does’nt mean that they should be above them as the other teams may beat opposition as strong as portugal or stronger and counter that loss - such as france beating brazil but france are still below them in the rankings and anyway alot of portugal’s games with England and Italy have been draws not wins.
Posted from 
United Kingdom
By Matt | September 22nd, 2006 at 1:05 pm The FIFA world rankings, although a massive improvement since the newly release rankings, should be ranked like this:
1.France
2.Italy
3.Brazil
4.Germany
5.Portugal
6.Argentina
7.Netherlands
8.Spain
9.Mexico
10.England
11.Ukraine
12.Australia
13.Switzerland
14.USA
15.Uruguay
15.Croatia
15.Sweden
18.Denmark
19.Colombia
20.Ghana
20.Cote d’Ivoire
Posted from Australia
By Matt | September 22nd, 2006 at 1:12 pm Oh Shit forgot the czech Republic!
Ok Rankings should be like this:
1.France
2.Italy
3.Brazil
4.Germany
5.Portugal
6.Argentina
7.Netherlands
8.Spain
9.Mexico
10.England
11.Czech Republic
12.Ukraine
13.Australia
14.Switzerland
15.USA
16.Uruguay
16.Croatia
16.Sweden
19.Denmark
20.Colombia
21.Ghana
21.Cote d’Ivoire
23.Ecuador
24.Nigeria
25.Cameroon
Posted from Australia
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