FIFA World Ranking

Discussion in 'Women's International' started by jonny63, Mar 17, 2006.

  1. hotjam2

    hotjam2 Member+

    Nov 23, 2012
    Club:
    Real Madrid

    because of the huge investments as compared to the rest of the world(especally comapared to South America(Conmebol)
    D-AfUBDWkAAUM4d.jpg
     
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  2. Jayce Cook

    Jayce Cook New Member

    Liverpool FC
    England
    Jun 20, 2019
    YEP ....... I GOT IT
     
  3. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Do the ratings matter? Tomorrow, USA will play France in the quarter-finals, in a match universally agreed would be worthy of a semi-final or final match.

    How could this have been prevented, other than by "everyone says" these teams shouldn't meet before the semi-finals so let's seed the knockout bracket in a way that they can't - (as long as they finish a-top their group)?

    By seeding the knockout bracket using the ratings so they can't meet before the semi-finals - again provided they finish a-top their group.

    The four highest-rated teams all finished on top of their group (and France, as well as being one of those four is also the host country, which can be taken into consideration). If the ratings are reasonably reliable, they give us a way to objectively seed the tournament to avoid two top teams meeting too early in the knockout rounds - or at least reduce the odds of it.
     
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  4. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Through the Round of 16, using the performance ratings heading into the World Cup, there has been 12 matches between teams separated by 25 performance rating points to 175.

    Average rating difference (performance rating): 95
    Average expected win percentage (OR expected decimal result as given by the FIFA conversion table): (.631)
    Actual average result: (.640)
    The actual result for this set of matches is almost exactly what's predicted by the performance ratings.

    ***
    Now, we can do this for other sets of matches with progressively higher rating differentials. As the rating differentials go up, naturally the win percentage or actual results (which will be measured as decimal numbers according to the FIFA table) should go up, if everything was perfect and the sample size is large enough, etc etc.

    For matches with (performance) rating differentials between 75 and 225 points, the win percentage goes up but more than expected or predicted:

    # of matches: 13
    Average performance rating difference: 156
    Average expected win percentage/decimal result: (.707)
    Actual average result: (.762) The higher-rated teams outperformed their expected results, despite a couple big upsets in this group (South Korea losing to Nigeria and Scotland only getting a draw against Argentina)

    ***
    For matches with performance rating differentials between 125 and 275 points:

    # of matches: 11
    Average performance rating difference: 207
    Average expected win percentage/decimal result: (.764)
    Actual average result: (.679)

    This is a relatively large deviation from the expected results. This set of matches includes, in addition to South Korea/Nigeria and Scotland/Argentina, New Zealand's loss to Cameroon.

    ***
    For matches with performance rating differentials between 175 and 325 points:

    # of matches: 11
    Average performance rating difference: 248
    Average expected win percentage/decimal result: (.804)
    Actual average result: (.806)

    Things look "back to normal." The actual average result is almost exactly the expected result.

    ***
    Again, this gets a little technical and I should put this in a table or graph for easier reading but I wanted to kick this out there while I had a few minutes.
     
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  5. cpthomas

    cpthomas BigSoccer Supporter

    Portland Thorns
    United States
    Jan 10, 2008
    Portland, Oregon
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    However, what a rating difference of 300 really means isn't that there's an expected game result for any single game, including the next game. What it means is that if the teams were to play 100 times, you would expect the better rated team to win 85 of the times and the poorer rated team to win 15 of the times. This is important when you are predicting how a team will do over a series of games. You shouldn't expect it to win every game where its rating is better than the opponent, even if substantially better. Rather, you should expect it to win only a percentage of those games, depending on what the percentages for all games are. This is widely misunderstood and results in people often thinking something must be wrong with a team that doesn't win every game where it's significantly better rated.

    For example, if a team has a 90% win probability in every game it plays, wins 9 straight, and then loses 1, the tendency is to see the 1 loss as indicating the team is in trouble. In fact, it has performed exactly as the ratings, 10 games ago, said it should.
     
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  6. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    This is true and important to understanding the ratings. It's the best and simplest way to understand the expected win percentage or probability which correspond to rating differences between two teams (in our example 300 points)

    Yet, I believe, it's also true that a certain expected game result (expressed in decimal form, a number between 0 and 1, as designated by the FIFA table) is also implied. But I don't want to dwell too long on it at the moment. I might confuse people or, more likely, I'll confuse myself.

    For our purpose at the moment, I used those decimal scores (for example .85 for 1-0 win, .92 for 2-0 win) from the FIFA ratings table to see how well the ratings seemed to predict the results so far in the World Cup, which resulted in these rather satisfying numbers!

    Of course, I plan to also compare the expected win percentages with the results given in simple Elo or chess form (1 point for win; 1/2 point for draw; 0 points for loss). I can already tell the correlation won't be as good, which won't be surprising in a small sample of games where the results can only take one of three values: zero, half-point, or one point)
     
  7. Chicago76

    Chicago76 Member+

    Jun 9, 2002
    The easiest way to achieve bracket balance is to create three categories of Pot A teams to align with the knockout pairings pre-draw. There are three different paths for the 1st place group finishers.

    Easiest were drawn by Germany and England. They got a #3 in R16 and winner of two 2nd place teams in quarters. Should have been drawn such that those went to host France and #1 USA (renamed Groups A and F, respectively).

    Middle path were drawn by France and Australia. Both got a #3 in R16 and winner of 1st/2nd in quarters. Those two spots should have been blindly drawn between the next highest rated teams (Germany and England). So assuming France, USA, Germany and England won their group, none would play prior to semis.

    The most difficult path were drawn by USA and Canada. Group winners in these groups were the only two to play a 2nd place team in R16. Canada and Australia should have been drawn into these two groups.

    The last step I would have taken would be to draw the top 2 teams from Pot B (Japan and Netherlands) into Canada and Australia's groups as the bottom two pot A teams. 2nd place from these groups (being more top heavy) would face 2nd place groups finishers in R16.

    Based on tourney form, none of USA, Germany, France, or England would have met until semis. Japan/Netherlands would have been spared one another in an R16 too.
     
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  8. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    @Chicago76 it's a good thought but you have to remember as well that the bracket was decided before the draw was. Tiering Pot 1 wouldn't have fixed France's path since France wasn't drawn to begin with - they were defaulted group A slot 1, which forced a group winner in the QFs anyway. I think the draw should always be random save the host, but the bracket could have been built better.
     
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  9. Chicago76

    Chicago76 Member+

    Jun 9, 2002
    The knockouts are drawn first, but they are still drawn in a balanced manner. The bracket can’t be “built better”, which is the problem. Each half of the bracket gets the following:

    1st v 3rd R16 meeting 2nd v 2nd R16 in quarters
    1st v 2nd R16 meeting 1st v 3rd R16 in quarters

    That is as balaced/fair as the bracket can be built.

    Two problems:
    1) this is the women’s WC. Not the men’s. So the field depth isn’t there. There are only 12 sides that have represented tier I and II of the game over the last 20 years. Not all of them will be strong at any point in time, but none will be bottom quarter of the draw weak, so it is very important to insure they are distributed evenly (based upon their current strength) in the knockout.

    2) even though the knockout bracket is efficient, teams are assigned to those positions via “luck” and unlike the men’s game, we pretty much know who will get to at least the quarters. Because the field isn’t deep enough to generate a sufficient number of upsets.

    So the teams drawn in to the 3rd place R16 meeting a 2v2 in quarters tend to have much easier paths. If the name of the game is to build on host enthusiasm and to preserve the likelihood of creating the most compelling matches from the QF onward, you want to save the host and #1 on opposite sides. Then let teams 3-8 in particular smash it out more directly, but in a balanced way to claim QF/SF status.

    Instead:
    Group A and F: France/USA each with one of SWE, BRA, ESP, NOR
    Group B and E: Germany/England each with one of SEE, BRA, ESP, NOR
    Group C and D, ie the top heavy with Australia/CAN each with one of JAP/NED.

    A1 vs 3rd
    C2 vs B2

    B1 vs 3rd
    C1 vs A2

    On the other side sub F for A, D for C and E for B.

    This was kinda the same problem with the 24 team Euro, coincidentally. Big tournament with thinner top line talent than a 16 team Euro or 32 team WC. Upsets too. The brackets were nowhere near balanced.
     
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  10. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    #1210 SiberianThunderT, Jun 29, 2019
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2019
    I think you missed my point?

    Yes, the bracket is as fair as it can be when you ignore the relative strengths of the pot 1 teams.

    But in your first post, you said you wanted France to be on a path that faced a 3rd place team in the R16 and then the winner of a 2nd-v-2nd matchup in the QFs. I was pointing out that the bracket was pre-built to make that an impossibility - A1 (the host team) was slated to meet F1 in the QFs right from the start. So no matter who F1 was - because yes, the draw as-is comes down to luck - it was always going to be a bit more slanted than it could (and probably should) be.

    That's what I was trying to get at - the bracket could have been "built better" if someone wanted to follow your initial suggestion had they made it so A1 wouldn't theoretically face another seeded team until the SFs. Only if that condition was met would the rest of your suggestion - the top teams on the 1/3-2/2 paths, the next four split on the 1/3/-1/2 paths with the appropriate R16 match - even be feasible. A1 is always a given as the hosts - so in theory, a bracket can be built better around that fact. This Cup wasn't.
     
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  11. Weltmann

    Weltmann Member

    Sep 9, 2012
    Would be interesting to see, how much Germany will fall in the rankings. Not sure if I can remember Germany ever below 2nd place. Maybe after 2011 or 2017??
     
  12. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    Germany has been 3rd for five releases ever:
    --the first two releases, where Norway was 2nd, then Germany won the 2003 WC
    --two releases in 2009 when Brazil was 2nd until Germany won the 2009 EURO
    --one release in 2018 when England was 2nd

    I think I may follow-up my previous calculation post later today just to see roughly what to expect. We already saw England overtake France for 3rd and I bet they just passed Germany too.
     
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  13. Weltmann

    Weltmann Member

    Sep 9, 2012
    Thank you very much. At least Germany and France can hold hands and share the misery.
     
    MiLLeNNiuM repped this.
  14. Chicago76

    Chicago76 Member+

    Jun 9, 2002
    I think we’re saying the same thing actually. At first when you were referring to building a better bracket I thought you were referring to the balance within the drawn knockout pairings. I think we both agree that those aren’t the problem.

    The team draw into groups is where the imbalance occurs, due to the strength disparity among Pot A and Pot B teams given the more shallow pool of teams on the women’s side.

    Where we differ is on the feasibility of steering certain group winners into relatively easier (or more difficult) knockout paths. If FIFA would go to the trouble of drawing USA/France, GER/ENG and CAN/AUS separately, not having a pre-drawn 16 team knockout is not a logistical hurdle. Just don’t do it and use the bracket I proposed. One in which the brackets remain balanced and the team strength also becomes much more balanced. Fixed.

    I get people’s hesitance to “steer” the field that much, but this is a very different animal than the men’s side where the best laid plans are ruined regardless because of the relative parity.

    If this was a tourney with more similar depth (FIBA, rugby, cricket), they see to it that they don’t place the host (as one of the 3 favorites) on a collision course with the #1 or #2 team in the world as early as the quarters. It’s not good from an equity/competition, entertainment or financial standpoint. Now there’s always the chance that a team underperforms, drops to second and we see a big matchup earlier than expected. But if a top 4-6 side finishes 2nd in a group, on current form, they probably aren’t a top 4-6 side and deserve their knockout placement.

    If you’re selling a product worth over a hundred million and you can make it better with a predetermined knockout bracket rather than taking the additional step of drawing knockout pairings, what’s the hurdle?
     
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  15. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    Alright, let's do some calcs...
    Thankfully we haven't had a single knockout match (so far) that was a draw aside from 1-1, so all point changes are symmetric

    GER 3-0 NGA : +2pts (exp. 0.927 vs act. 0.960)
    NOR 1-1 AUS: +5pts (exp. 0.419 vs act. 0.500)
    ENG 3-0 CMR: +0pts (exp. 0.952 vs act. 0.960)
    FRA 2-1 BRA: +5pts (exp. 0.763 vs act. 0.840)**
    USA 2-1 ESP: +3pts (exp. 0.782 vs act 0.840)
    SWE 1-0 CAN: +24pts (exp. 0.454 vs act. 0.850)
    ITA 2-0 CHN: +23pts (exp. 0.536 vs act. 0.920)
    NED 2-1 JPN: +17pts (exp. 0.560 vs act. 0.840)

    ENG 3-0 NOR: +17pts (exp. 0.681 vs act. 0.960)
    USA 2-1 FRA: +23pts (exp. 0.456 vs act. 0.840)**
    NED 2-0 ITA: +16pts (exp. 0.648 vs act. 0.920)
    SWE 2-1 GER: +29pts (exp. 0.349 vs act. 0.840)

    This means that the 16 that made it to the knockout phase should have roughly these values to date:
    USA - 2146, ENG - 2085, GER - 2058, FRA - 2031, NED - 2030, SWE - 2008, AUS - 1983, CAN - 1963, BRA - 1941, DPK - 1940, JPN - 1938, NOR - 1919, ESP - 1895, ITA - 1892, DEN - 1840, CHN - 1837, NGA - 1642, CMR - 1548
    Bold are still active; italics are the top two reference teams not at the WWC. Sweden vs Germany was the upset of the KO round thus far but only 4th or 5th biggest of the tournament. And look at that Canada drop!

    Tight cluster around that top 10 cutoff - I don't expect I have the exact order correct since I've ignored the pre-tournament friendlies and such, so I don't know for sure if Japan has dropped out or not. (Similarly I'm not sure if ITA or ESP is ahead - sorry about both @blissett !)

    I don't think ENG passes USA for first unless ENG wins the cup and USA gets 4th. In fact, shed a tear for whatever team will eventually place 4th, because they're about to have all their points gains from the tournament so far essentially wiped out.
     
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  16. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Estimated performance ratings of the eight quarterfinalists since 1/1/2018:

    USA 2134 (official 2101)
    * Germany 2056 (2072)
    England 2047 (2049)
    * France 2046 (2043)
    Netherlands 2041 (1967)
    Sweden 2017 (1962)
    * Norway 1929 (1915)
    * Italy 1900 (1868)

    * Eliminated in quarter-finals

    World cup matches add to the volatility of the ratings because they are weighted 4 times more than a regular friendly. Nevertheless, after the quarter-finals, we see the performance ratings for most teams reverts back close to the official rating. Main exceptions so far: Netherlands and Sweden.
     
  17. hotjam2

    hotjam2 Member+

    Nov 23, 2012
    Club:
    Real Madrid
    I understand the interest in ratings/rankings, but based on the Dutch performance, it's all moot. I mean the Dutch have proven once again that their a great 'tournament' team, but not necessarily for one, two years between tournaments(where their rankings fell).
    There are reason's for this, their entire starting lineup plays in foreign leagues(which proves another fallacy; thst you don't have to have a great domestic league). So when the team meets & practicing for the weekend for a friendly or qualifier, the chemistry is not the same as a squad that might take a month togeteher to practice for a tourney.

    considering the next big tourney will be the Olympics & 2nd & 4th rated teams didn't qualify, willl rankings really matter anymore? plus how we're going to rank #3 England when they play as Great Britian? Plus consider too; Neville will have to dump at elast 5 players from his rather deep team(as OL only allow 18 players) plus possbily 3 or more otheres to make room for the other confedrations. Why would they keep their own rankings with a brand new team?

    so I would say, rankings are once again moot!
     
  18. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Most commentators said this tournament was going to be the most wide-open, competitive Women's World Cup ever - and some of us backed it up on the basis of the ratings. How can that be? Don't the rankings predict that the teams ranked #1 to #4 will make the semi-finals? I've made the point that in the ratings (as opposed to simply the rankings), the number of teams within 100 to 150 points of the top few teams was larger this year compared to previous World Cups, in other words the number of teams with a decent shot of an upset over a top four team was larger.

    Add in the vagaries of the bracket (the "luck of the draw") and the ratings indicated a fair possibility of a team ranked even as low as #12 or #13 making the semifinals. With a rating of 1967 and the #2/#3/#4 teams ranked 2072/2049/2043, Netherlands was always clearly one of those candidates, keeping in mind a team rated 100 points lower than another has a (.36) expected odds of upsetting the higher rated team and advancing past them to the next round.

    As it is, Netherlands so far hasn't had to pull off a major upset. They were rated only 24 points below Japan, an insignificant amount. (And that was a very even match and Netherlands needed a lucky break to advance in regulation time.)

    Netherlands was at a 39-point disadvantage to Canada in the group stage battle for 1st place, also not a big amount. Canada's expected win probability was (.556) -- and in the performance ratings it was a toss-up. Canada's performance rating since 1/1/2018 heading into the tournament was 1980 and Netherland's was 1969.

    In the quarterfinals, thanks in part to luck of the draw, Netherlands didn't have to upset anybody; they were favored over Italy, the upstart who finished first in their group ahead of Australia and Brazil.

    ***
    Only two of the top-four ranked teams are left but of course one of them, France, was eliminated by another top-four team, the US. Germany was eliminated by Sweden - and that counts as an upset but the kind of upset the ratings tell us to expect at the World Cup. Germany (rating 2072) had a rating advantage of 110 points over Sweden (1962), which corresponds to a (.653) expected odds to advance. But conversely, that means Sweden had about a 35% chance of an upset.

    (In the performance ratings, Germany's edge was a little bit higher but still not overwhelming. Germany's performance rating heading into the game was 2107; Sweden's was 1987; Germany's expected odds to advance was .667)

    ***
    The ratings are easily misunderstood. Ratings aren't meant to take the place of crystal balls. To do the job of crystal balls, some of us use... crystal balls. And jinxes and hexes.

    To see a rating system working well and doing a decent job of projecting the probabilities of upsets is itself useful because it helps to have a good rating system. The rating system was used to determine the pots in the draw. The rating system could have been used to help keep apart the very top teams from having to meet in the quarter-finals.

    Properly used, the rating system can be used by teams and their fans to assess how well their team is doing, because it gives a benchmark to the strength of the opposition they're facing.

    And, at least to me, the ratings can help us give respect to good teams, teams which may have little chance of winning the World Cup but which have reached a level which merits some respect and not be shrugged off as nobodies. Teams in the 1800 range, for instance, like Scotland, Belgium, Iceland, Austria. Teams in the upper 1800 to 1900 range like Italy, which some journalists dismissed as poor without knowing anything, or Spain, which some of us knew was a team on the upward swing.
     
  19. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    If the Netherlands were consistently a "great tournament team", then their placements at the last three Algarves (when they had time to train together) wouldn't be so volatile. Also, as kolabear pointed out, there hasn't been a single noticeable upset in their run so far - which was also true of their EURO championship run. Once again, you're using single examples (one team, the Netherlands, in one short run of games) to try to invalidate an entire system, which is entirely missing the forest for the trees, on top of being entirely blind to context.

    Also: have you not at all followed my real-time ratings updates? kolabear's post compared their real-time performance ratings to the static official ratings from last release. If you followed my posts at all, you'd see that NED's real-time rating at the same level as France and just one win away from being ahead of Germany. Again, it's you being entirely blind to context. You really should stop coming into the rankings thread to bash the rankings when you don't know shit about what the rankings are saying.

    Also, to answer your ill-informed question about Team GB: since GB isn't a FIFA entity, they can't have an official ranking, and all matches involving team GB won't affect the rankings.
     
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  20. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Oh, I haven't minded the criticism or skepticism towards the system - it gives me a chance to make some points about it which are frequently misunderstood. And even though Netherlands hasn't had to pull off a major upset in either this World Cup run yet or in their run to the Euro Championships, that doesn't take away what they've done in these tournaments. It's still quite a feat to have won 11 or 12 major tournament matches in a row from a ratings standpoint because the ratings say the probability of winning all these games in a row is low, even if they were favored in many of them.

    Of course I have to wonder if they're benefiting considerably from a "homefield advantage" even though the World Cup is in France. As we all know, the Dutch fans are really behind their team, packing the stadiums and marching in rivers of orange through the cities where the matches are being played. Their players have said it's felt like playing at home.
     
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  21. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    Oh, yeah, it's still an impressive win record, and they're still a good team. (What's your 12th match though? Are you saying the SF is the 12th and not a win b/c it's TBD?) But lack of a truly tough test does, in my mind, put a *small* asterisk on the team. I always like to say things like "you can't be a top 5 team until you regular take points from top 5 teams" and losses to Norway, Poland, and Spain (twice) in the past two years put that chink in the armour. Netherlands didn't even play other top-ten teams very often, though in just the past year they've beaten Australia, Canada, and Japan, so I would personally say that they're definitely playing their wan into that top 5 now - which matches my calculations from earlier too.

    I think either @cpthomas or @Cliveworshipper made a similar supposition in another thread, the the tournament being in Europe has boosted European performance. It's certainly worth pointing out that, for every MWC until 2010 in South Africa, Europe failed to win the MWC if the MWC was not held in Europe. Also worth pointing out that the USWNT has similarly said (both last time in Canada and this time in France) that the traveling USA fans made it feel like a home tournament. Home field advantage, even if it's not direct, certainly counts for something.
     
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  22. kolabear

    kolabear Member+

    Nov 10, 2006
    los angeles
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I simply couldn't remember if they played 6 games or 7 in the 2017 Euros and was a) too lazy to look it up, and b) didn't think anyone would ask about it :)

    I get your point about Netherlands being a top five team but they're getting close and of course the ratings have already shown it. The quasi-homefield advantage also seems to be a factor. And it looks like they could be #5 now from your back-of-the-envelope calculations. I would think so since they weren't far behind #5Canada/#6Australia/#7Japan
     
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  23. Tbh only the Olympics (delighted we now qualified), the Euro and the WC are considered tournements by the Dutch. The rest is nice to win, but more an opportunity to exercise and experiment with other players and tactics than a must have trophee.
    So, no. Only the results in the 3 I mentioned are considered.
     
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  24. The Orange Lionesses donot yet (tournement outside the summer holiday season doesnot help either) make the Orange fans on the move like with the Orange Lions.
    If they would win this afternoon and beat the Lions on the first Orange World Cup, I think it will boost the support to such a level that as with the male team the Orange fans en masse will travel across the world, like in South Africa.
     
  25. SiberianThunderT

    Sep 21, 2008
    DC
    Club:
    Saint Louis Athletica
    Nat'l Team:
    Spain
    Alright, let's guesstimate what the last four matches did to the ratings.
    England fans, you may want to stop reading now.

    USA 2-1 ENG: +15pts (exp. 0.587 vs act. 0.840)
    NED 1-0 SWE: +19pts (exp. 0.532 vs act. 0.850)
    SWE 2-1 ENG: +27pts (exp. 0.385 vs act 0.840)
    USA 2-0 NED: +16pts (exp. 0.656 vs act. 0.920)

    Which leaves us with an approximate rating list of:
    USA - 2178, GER - 2058, ENG - 2043, NED - 2033, FRA - 2031, SWE - 2016, AUS - 1983, ...
    Rating doesn't mean must in terms of winning titles as long as a team peaks at the right time, and boy did Sweden peak at the right time! Honestly I'm expecting them to come back down a significant bit by the time the Olympics are over next year since, to me, their results have been better than their style of play, but hey congrats to them anyway for climbing so high. Also, it looks like France have fallen significantly from their #3 rank due to three other UEFA teams climbing - FRA's rating hasn't fallen *too* much despite the early exit. But being the host certainly hampered their ability to accrue points this tournament.

    And to list my big caveat: I didn't factor in any friendlies that happened between the previous release and the start of the tournament, so I would not be surprised if some teams are +/- 15pts or so from what I've calculated, depending on those pre-WWC friendlies, so take the order of teams from GER to FRA (a span of just 27pts above, with just 4pts between GER and SWE and just 2pts between NED and FRA) with a massive grain of salt.

    =EDIT1= OMG I did an addition instead of a subtraction for SWE, hang on one really hot second while I fix things...
    =EDIT2= okay, fixed I guess... That's a doofus move on my part! The order passes the sniff test much better now, though.
     
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