Canada up from number 83 to 54 thanks to the new ranking system. http://www.fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index/0,2548,All-Jul-2006,00.html
The question remains....is the fifa ranking a true level where a country really is. How can canada which does not play enough during a 12 month calander jump up from 83 to 54? We have not set the world on fire with our recent results yet we jump up this high?
Well, we've just beaten Austria (# 60) in Vienna 2-0 and we've tied the USA (# 16) in the US, so I feel like it's seems fair at the moment. I think we should be somewhere between 55 and 70. We'll see what kind of result we can get against Jamaica this fall, that could help our ranking and finding out what our real ranking is.
Why a big jump ? Its a new Ranking method. Period is 4 years now and not 8 years, other important changes too. http://www.fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index.html
Ahh it'd be nice if they had rankings for youth, or rankings for the entire national program as well.
That's tough to do, the youth player pools change every 2 years so the rankings would be rendered meaningless as soon as the next one starts. then you have to wait for each country to get their next cycle in gear and play friendlies for fifa to rank them...
What I particuarly like is that it doesn't look nearly so bad in the press to say 54 as opposed to 81. We've got a long way to go but at least the public perception is not nearly so horrible. B
Absolutely, the casual fans might respect Canadian soccer a little more if they hear we're in the 50's as opposed to the 80's...that is as long as Canada keeps getting results and doesn't slide...
I've always felt our ranking is far too low. And I was expecting a big change with the new rankings. No complaints because being ranked 54th is good for Canada in hopes of getting better friendly opponents. Competitive nations would rather compete a team ranked 54th then 81st!
That is an excellent point. It makes one wonder how things could have been different if this new method of calculation had been implemented two or three years ago. B
...All international "A" matches http://www.fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/rank/procedures/0,2540,3,00.html
I'm happy with the rise in Canada's ranking and hopefully this will benefit our team with better competition and morale, but I see a lot of problems with the new system. With its "regional strength" criteria additionally penalizing weaker confederations, this is going to hurt CONCACAF and AFC, while assisting the others. To take an example, my other team Korea dropped from 29 to 56. This isn't like the US where their ranking was overly inflated to begin with. Coupled with the fact that Korea didn't do too badly in the past World Cup (not enough to justify the big drop anyway), I fail to see how they could drop so far while Togo, quite possibly the worst team in the World Cup and in fact losing to Korea, rises to take place #48. As happy as I am with Canada, as a member of CONCACAF this could hurt us in the long run. The top sides in UEFA, CAF and every single country in CONMEBOL saw their rankings rise. I can understand the UEFA due to their strong showing at the World Cup, but how does every South American country go up? And in the case of Africa, it's almost as if FIFA's designed a system which will justify more spots for Africa in 2010.
Wasn't the USA team their second team made up of MLS players only? The Austria result was the better of the two. The two games with jamaica in the fall will show us where we are in the battle with other Concacaf countries. It's funny that the CSA is lining up these games yet have no manager to run the club?
The CSA had a manager when they announce those 2 games and he decided to quit. And now we have an interim coach who'll run the team untill the end of the year, so I,m not sure the CSA should cancel those 2 games because we don,t have a permanent head coach.....
What floors me is that they jumped from 10th to 6th in Concacaf. This team has trouble making the final 12 in WCQ, let alone the hexagonal. New rankings within Concacaf: 1-5: USA, Mexico, Honduras, Costa Rica, Guatemala 6-10: Canada, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica 11-15: Cuba, St. Lucia, Haiti, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Guyana, St. Kitts and Nevis 16-20: Antigua and Barbuda, El Salvador, Surinam, Barbados, Grenada 21-25: Bermuda, Nicaragua, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Netherlands Antilles 26-29: Dominica, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Bahamas 30 (5-way tie at zero points): Aruba, Belize, Montserrat, Turks and Caicos Islands, US Virgin Islands (Anguilla: no longer ranked) I would almost want to place all of #7 Panama to #11 Cuba above Canada, maybe even #17 El Salvador.
I can't recall the last time Canada had troubles making the semi's - I guess it was in qualifying for 1990 World Cup when a loss to a pretty strong team came on the away goals rule (and an own goal in a rain storm to boot). Losing to Cuba in Gold Cup - even though we badly outplayed them - was enough to force the resignation of our coach - and in the last qualifying semi, we split with Guatemala, had two victories over Honduras converted to draws through outright theft - the one at home requiring two abominations from the official to achieve eventhat. I'd agree that T&T over the past 4 years should be ranked higher althoguh I think they have sucked a lot outside of the most recent WCQ. No one else is better than Canada, Jamiacia probably equal.
Not sure I agree with that really. I think the current ranking is more accurate than the previous one, and Canada's position now is not unreasonable. Note that the previous ranking system was based partly on a team's "best" 7 results each year. With Canada playing so few matches, we were always at a disadvantage ranking-wise to the teams that played a lot more games. Eg, from the old rankings to the new ones, we jumped ahead of four teams: Panama, Cuba, T&T, and Jamaica. From 2000-2005 (just to pick a random sample of recent years), here are the total number of 'A' games played by these teams: Panama: 85 Cuba: 63 T&T: 123 Jamaica: 103 Canada: 57 Now that the number of games played is not a factor, we're back on a level playing-field. I'd agree that T&T belong ahead of us, but I'm not so sure that Guatemala and Honduras do.
If by "has trouble making the final 12 in WCQ" you mean "wins by 8-0 aggregate", then you're absolutely correct.
Sept in Montreal against Jamaica and the return in Jamaica is in October check the csa site for dates ( I mean the game dates)
New FIFA ranking and Canada down to number 82 ! http://www.fifa.com/en/mens/statistics/index/0,2548,All-Aug-2006,00.html FIFA explain Canada`s ranking : "mainly due to the devaluation of significant 2005 Gold Cup matches in the calculation over the past few weeks."