Costa Rica Sports News – Does FIFA actually watch soccer or do they just get money from teams to arbitrarily do the rankings? I watched the World Cup in Brazil and witnessed Costa Rica defeat both Greece and Uruguay. What are these rankings based on? Is it kind of like pre-season college football rankings which are based on previous years and overrates certain teams?
After some more research we got our answers, but it does not make them right in our eyes. Kind of like giving Messi the award for best player in the World Cup Tournament. That was definitely not true.
In the first post-World Cup edition of the FIFA World Rankings, champions Germany ascended to the top spot, while the US national team dropped two spots to rank 15th in the world.
The US averaged 609 ranking points earned from their four World Cup games, thanks largely to the win over Ghana. The FIFA World Rankings are calculated by combining per-game ranking points from the last four calendar years, with results from prior years given less weight than those in 2014.
The FIFA rankings do not differentiate between an extratime loss and a regulation loss, meaning the US Round of 16 defeat to Belgium earned 0 points. The late goal surrendered in the tie against Portugal cost the US 1,473 ranking points, which would have significantly increased their total 2014 per-game average of 554.94.
Big movers from June’s rankings included the Netherlands (No. 3) and Costa Rica (No. 16), who both moved up 12 spots after strong World Cup performances. No. 4 Colombia (+4) and No. 5 Belgium (+6) also made big moves.
Tumbling in the rankings were No. 8 Spain and No. 11 Portugal, both down seven spots, but No. 20 England had it worst among the big nations, dropping 10 spots.
Rival Mexico moved up two spots to 18th after their own Round of 16 exit in the World Cup, while Honduras dropped seven spots to No. 40 after going 0-3 in Brazil.
MLSsoccer staff, MLSsoccer.com introduction added by Dan Stevens
