Football: FIFA releases World rankings, Spain knock Brazil off top spot
This summer’s World Cup in South Africa had a lot of surprises with Italy and France getting knocked out in the first round, England in the second and Brazil and Argentina in the third.
So with such fluctuating results at the game’s premier competition there were bound to be changes in the FIFA World rankings which were due to be out once the football extravaganza finished in South Africa.
The Federation of International Football Association (FIFA) just a few hours ago released the latest world rankings of football. There were some surprising changes as the usual suspects surrendered their positions to newcomers.
There are no surprises at the top as Brazil, who was at the top of the perch before the start of the World Cup, is replaced by the new World Champions Spain.
Spain had a terrific tournament and it is only just that they have taken their position at the top of the rankings. Before the start of the tournament Spain were in second position. But winning the most prestigious tournament in the world has given them plenty of points to overtake Brazil to go to the top and Brazil’s dismal show at the competition also did not help.
Netherlands, who went into the tournament placed at number four, also climbed two places to the second spot, overtaking Brazil.
The Dutch narrowly overtook Brazil on the points tally after progressing to the finals of the World Cup, beating the Samba boys along the way.
Germany, who finished the tournament in third place, also jumped two places to land at fourth place, before they were languishing at the sixth spot.
Fifth in the rankings is Argentina, who lost to the Dutch at the quarter final stages of the World Cup.
The biggest surprise in the rankings has been the South American side Uruguay, who have climbed to sixth position. Their highest since the FIFA rankings were introduced. La Celeste have had a wonderful tournament in South Africa where they progressed to the semi finals to the World Cup to the surprise of all and sundry. Uruguay was spurred on by some stellar performances from their dynamic attacking duo of Diego Forlan and Luis Suarez. Forlan finished the tournament with 5 goals and also won the best player of the tournament award, the Golden Ball.
England rise one place in the FIFA’s official World Rankings to the seventh spot. Despite their dismal show at the World Cup. England were knocked out of the tournament in the second round at the hands of Germany, losing 4-1 in a lop sided affair. England’s World Cup performance was confirmed as their worst ever show in the history of the competition, as FIFA rated them 13 out of the 32 participating teams.
It was still however considerably better that the likes of Italy and France who were rated as 26 and 29 respectively after failing to progress past the first round of the competition.
The decline of the two sides also reflects in their rankings as the 2006 champions Italy fell six places to 11. While the 1998 Champions, France slipped 12 places to a lowly 21 in the rankings.
The biggest movers in the rankings are the Kiwis, who have climbed 24 places to finish at the 54. After going through to the first round of the competition unbeaten but still their performances were not good enough to guarantee them a place in the second round. But they can take some solace in their new rankings.
Elsewhere in the rankings, Scotland climb two places to the 41st spot and Northern Ireland fell three places to the 59th position. Wales are down seven places to 84th and The Republic of Ireland moved up five places to 3. All four sides failed to qualify for this summer’s World Cup and their next task would be to make it to the Euro 2012, which will be held in Poland and Ukraine.
Engalnd and Wales are both in the same group with the two sides meeting for the first time in the qualifiers on the 26th of March at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff with the return leg at Wembley on the 6th of September.
England and Wales will also take on Switzerland, ranked 18th in the world.
The top 10 FIFA World Rankings are:
1. Spain
2. Netherlands
3. Brazil
4. Germany
5. Argentina
6. Uruguay
7. England
8. Portugal
9. Egypt
10. Chile
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