FIFA Rankings: Jan 18, 2006...we are even with MX

[mpetrik]

http://fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index/0,2548,113650,00.html?articleid=113650

Obviously not much activity in the past month...

For those who care...Spain and France each have one more point than the US and MX, so it is conceivable that we can be #5 by mid-March if we beat Germany.

[soccrfn]

Who the frick cares?

[Dammit!]

Who the frick cares?

By that standard, BS would be about ten threads total.

I can't believe France is so highly ranked when their average player is 45 years old and is generally coming off a champagne hangover. Zidane is only good because he's learned to play drunk. Genius.

[El Chuma]

http://fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index/0,2548,113650,00.html?articleid=113650

Obviously not much activity in the past month...

For those who care...Spain and France each have one more point than the US and MX, so it is conceivable that we can be #5 by mid-March if we beat Germany.

Well its good news to me. About time we drew even in the eyes of FIFA! :o

[Shackleton]

By that standard, BS would be about ten threads total.

I can't believe France is so highly ranked when their average player is 45 years old and is generally coming off a champagne hangover. Zidane is only good because he's learned to play drunk. Genius.

Remember the FIFA Rankings are based soley on past performance. Their entire first team could go down in a plane crash tomorrow and it wouldn't affect their ranking.

[Bees Knees]

I realize that the Fifa rankings are, for the most part, garbage. BUT, as an American living abroad it at least gives me some ammunition when talking about soccer with the doubters out there (basically the entire rest of the world). It also warms my heart to think about the Mexican reaction to all this.

[terrible15]

I think its fare that Mexico and the US are tied for seventh....these rankings dont really tell you the truth anyway...

[scaryice]

I realize that the Fifa rankings are, for the most part, garbage.

No, they're not. They are a pretty good indication of how teams have preformed in the past eight years. Of course they're not perfect, but they're not garbage either. People just like to complain, especially without knowing all the details of how they work.

[Bajoro]

I realize that the Fifa rankings are, for the most part, garbage. ...

I agree 100%.

Yet staring at the table, somewhat in disbelief that we're somehow ahead of Germany, England, Italy, Nigeria and Cameroon, Turkey, Denmark and Sweden, Ireland and Scotland... I feel a strange, weird sense of pride.

It's as if my crazy aunt wrote me a check for a billion dollars. I would know it was fake, but I would still appreciate the gesture.

[Zenga18]

No, they're not. They are a pretty good indication of how teams have preformed in the past eight years. Of course they're not perfect, but they're not garbage either. People just like to complain, especially without knowing all the details of how they work.

Do you know the details? The ranking process is absurd. Any rankings that take into account friendlies is a joke. Any rankings that only count the 7 best results, than averages the rest, is a joke. Any process were you get points for losing games is a joke. A team can lose 10-0 and have -100000 points for a game, but FIFA is run by idiots so it just gets rounded up to zero. And it's ridiculous to use any ranking system that takes into account the past 8 years to judge matches that take place today. Beating Ukraine, a team that won their preliminary group and is actually in the WC, means less than beating egypt. Who I'm sure had their rankings swell by beating Libya, Sudan and Benin by a combined score of 14-3 last year on their way to finishing 3rd in their African group.

[Elninho]

Still, you have to admit that Italy haven't exactly helped themselves by their results...

[russ]

I can't believe France is so highly ranked when their average player is 45 years old and is generally coming off a champagne hangover. Zidane is only good because he's learned to play drunk. Genius.
He's the Bode Miller of soccer!:)

[RevsRule]

All that matters is the seeding for the WC and Mexico got one and we didn't.

[BenC1357]

Remember the FIFA Rankings are based soley on past performance. Their entire first team could go down in a plane crash tomorrow and it wouldn't affect their ranking.
Actually, if you're talking about France and looking at their performance since EuroCup 00, a plane crash might actually help raise their ranking. :D

[mattjo]

I realize that the Fifa rankings are, for the most part, garbage. BUT, as an American living abroad it at least gives me some ammunition when talking about soccer with the doubters out there (basically the entire rest of the world). It also warms my heart to think about the Mexican reaction to all this.

Well hopefully you can quiet the criticism coming from the Dutch Antilles.:)

[mschofield]

By that standard, BS would be about ten threads total.

I can't believe France is so highly ranked when their average player is 45 years old and is generally coming off a champagne hangover. Zidane is only good because he's learned to play drunk. Genius.
There are players who play sober?
He stumbled and stammered his way to a decent hattrick this weekend, though.

[Soccernethost]

If they're garbage how come they line up pretty well with every other real-world, results-driven ratings system in the world?

[Shackleton]

I realize that the Fifa rankings are, for the most part, garbage.

They're a good, but not perfect, ranking of teams within the same confederation. They're a poor ranking of teams from different confederations.

If they're garbage how come they line up pretty well with every other real-world, results-driven ratings system in the world?

They line up well for teams from some confederations, but not others. For example, compare the FIFA Rankings to the ELO Rankings for the top CONCACAF and AFC teams:

Country FIFA ELO
Mexico 7 16
USA 7 14
Costa R. 21 36
Japan 15 21
Iran 19 19
S. Kor 29 45
Saudi 33 54

With the exception of Iran, those are significant differences. And the FIFA Rankings consistently rank teams from CONCACAF and AFC higher than does ELO. So, there really is a difference between these ranking formulas.

[Craig P]

Any rankings that take into account friendlies is a joke.
If you assert that, you are asserting that it's impossible to produce a meaningful interconfederation ranking of national teams. (There's basically no cross-play aside from the World Cup.) I'm not going to suggest that friendlies should be given the same weight as competitive matches, but I don't believe they're completely meaningless either.

And it's ridiculous to use any ranking system that takes into account the past 8 years to judge matches that take place today.
I don't understand what you're getting at here. Matches from eight years ago are not judged by the same standard as today (they are only weighted 1/8 as much). Surely you don't want to throw out all past results, so this comes down to a debate about how far back it's reasonable to go. I assert that eight years is not unreasonable (if not necessarily appropriate).

[ghazi]

. .what's all this talk about Zidane playing drunk?:confused: