FIFA World Ranking - AFC

I like to think that is true, but I don't. I disagree. There are times when the better team simply fails, not just in one match, but in a tournament and there are other times when the victors in tournament are not all that deserving at all. Not just in Asia, but in football around the globe. And not just in football, but in life more generally.

 

Look at Iraq for example. We lost 3 games in a row last June, but we were not playing really bad. We controlled the games, but at the end of the day it just wasn't enough.

We had a real goalscoring problem, and that became clear in the games. I believe Australia and Japan both deserved to qualify. They were not very impressive, but Iraq, Jordan and Oman were worse.

Same thing goes on for Group A..

I know there are cases where teams are really lucky (like getting an undeserved penalty) but in this qualification I didn't happen in my opinion. You can argue about Uzbekistan instead of Korea, and Oman instead of Jordan, but other than that the groups went like expected.

 

LOL. You idiot. It was a clear penalty.　

 

I agree with most of this post. This TM is nowhere CLOSE to the TM of the late 1990-2005. The major reason we qualified is not because this TM is better than the TM of 2002 or 2010 but because Asia has declined. Saudi Arabia has become a laughing stock. South Korea doesn't have PJS anymore. I do think Iran is one of the top 5-10 teams in Asia. According to FIFA, TM is ranked third in Asia. Jordan, UAE, Oman, China and Iraq are 6th-10th and I certainly and I definitely think we are better than all those countries (by better, I mean if we play them 100 times, we will beat them more than 50 times).

 

This is what I mean. Asia declined. It was clear from the beginning that Qatar and Lebanon had no chance.
I expected more from Iraq tbh, and Jordan suprised me a bit, but Japan and Australia were still favourites.

 

I agree that this Iranian team is the weakest we have had, and also that we would struggle or find it harder to win against lower ranked teams. But that is also true for South Korea and certainly Australia as well. Its not exclusive to Iran.
Japan is really the only team in Asia that has not declined like the rest of us.
The line between the top 4 and the lower ranked teams, is getting blurry. There isnt that big gap, as before.

 

Japan is still improving, but Korea and Australia especially are dropping hard. Uzbekistan, Jordan and the UAE are rising.

 

September 2013 Ranking! Korea is officially number 5 in Asia.

42 Japan
48 Iran
53 Australia
57 Uzbekistan
58 Korea Republic
73 Jordan
82 UAE
96 Oman
99 China
105 Iraq

 

looks like the normal order is restored. lol at @RickChelsea and all the koreans. after australia joined, i remember these people saying how 'Iran is not even in the top 4 best teams of asia anymore.' lol. for the record, 108 qatar and kuwait and saudi 12th in asia at 109, behind canada lol.

 

anyhow, I can't wait to see us play Brazil, Aussies play France and Japan to face a very strong Serbian defence!!
and of course Iran to trash Thailand so their FIFA rank improves. <3

 

are you scheduled to play brazil? you will get embarrassed. you have not done well in your friendlies. you guys get so many friendlies but you keep losing them, and also losing in asia. if Iran had the 'luxury' of playing such friendlies, we would be better than we even are. we would top our world cup qualification group with even more of a gap than this time.

 

IF we had money, IF we had a stable government, IF we didn't weave carpets all day, IF our FA was not so incompetent, IF we had the luxury....

To be honest, I don't care if Brazil beats us. Spain beat us 4-1, Brazil beat the Aussies 6-0, Uruguay beat Japan 4-2...but if you don't play these strong teams, how do u expect to get better?

 

yea but that is the problem... you keep playing them but you do not even get better. that is why we DID top the group.

 

It's ok man. Iran is better than Korea...I mean just look at the ranking, how can you argue against that?
ok bye now.

 

why are you acting childish? go take some deep breaths and come back later lol.

 

lol, don't get too excited guys, we're still gonna drop 20 points next month after beating thais.

 

Did you watch the 2nd game? Japan dominated every stat, more shots and more shots on target, more possession, more class, better football. Australia got the luckiest goal I have possibly ever seen, a mishit cross somehow sneaking in under the bar. Japan got a clear penalty (watch the replay of Mckay sticking his arm out), which was buried. Even australians couldn't believe how lucky their goal was.

 

....lol you can start claiming that when you get some results at World Cup level or make an Asian Cup final.

I mean we could go on FIFA ranks..........but Colombia are 3rd according to them so....

 

While many Iranians might engage in "IF" about this that or the other to vent their frustration at how things are compared to how they might feel their country deserves, one thing you have to understand is that all those "ifs" notwithstanding, Iran is still one of the very best in Asia. In fact, even when S.Korea finished 4th in the World Cup it hosted in 2002, and many Iranian fans became convinced that the Koreans had simply pulled far ahead of Iran, I knew that was not the case. Thus, while I am not much impressed by Iran at this juncture despite Iran topping its group and beating S.Korea home and away in the process, for most of the period between 1996 and 2006, Iran was simply better than S.Korea. And when we played S.Korea at the senior level during that entire period, S.Korea's coaches knew that Iran was better too: in our senior squad games in that period, ever since your 6:2 spanking in the 1996 Asian Cup, it was S.Korea that would adopt a largely cautious, defensive approach and posture. Not Iran. Its only rather recently that the tables have turned. Yet, while we are not longer that good or that confident, your team has suffered a major decline too. You need a lot of improvement as well.

As for playing tough opposition, I agree that we should play such teams. This particular team we have needs to be tested and needs to be tested desperately. Carlos Queiroz, however, seems to recognize the weaknesses of this team and is not at all anxious to see it tested and potentially embarrassed against top teams. That as well as the fact that our federation appears to have run out of money due to the drop in the value of the Iranian currency and has had to cancel our camps lately, has caused Iran not to play the kind of teams that it needs to play to start preparing itself for the World Cup.

 

You guys are getting trolled by a 16 year old. Just ignore him.

 

I don't agree much with FIFA rankings either. When we play Thailand and even if we thrash them, we will lose 20points.
I don't give a damn about funding, disorganized federation, government, or whatever. But if I were a Korean, I would not be trying to get involved in these conversations against Iranians until Korea beats Iran convincingly. Not to mention head to head rivalries.
All this posts about Iran being lucky and blah blah is showing you guys are in denial and if KNT mentality is like that (former korean coach), Iran will continue to "get lucky" against them.

You guys have struggled to beat Iran in your own ground for decades. Only times KNT beat Iran in Korean soul was in 1971 and 2005. Whether you like it or not, KNT always struggles vs. Iran no matter how bloody good they are.

 

With regard to rankings, my view is as follows:

1) Numerical rankings are not significant by themselves. What really counts is the points earned. Thus, if the difference in points between a team ranked say 57 (Uzbekistan with 579 points) and one ranked 97th (Georgia with 364 points) is 215 points, those two teams are still far closer to one another despite 4o teams separating them in the numeral rankings, than two teams that are separated by the same number of teams but by more points. For instance, Brazil ranked #8 with 1067 points compared to Iran ranked #48 with 633 points, which means a difference of 434 points but the same 40 places. Certainly, the difference (if any) between Uzbekistan despite being 40 places ahead of Georgia in the rankings is much less than the difference between Brazil and Iran which are numerically 40 places apart but have a much more significant difference in terms of points earned.

The real issue, in other words, to me when I want to compare to two teams based on the FIFA ranking, is the points that are giving to them, not merely their numerical place in the rankings.

2) I consider FIFA rankings (even looking at the points earned) to be less than reliable (to put it charitably) when comparing teams from different confederations. For instance, in the example I gave, it is not clear to me that Uzbekistan is really all that stronger than Georgia? It might be slightly stronger, but certainly not as much as is suggested by the rankings. However, I do consider FIFA's rankings to be a more or less reasonable summation of where two teams from the same confederation are doing right now relative to one another. To be sure, a reasonable summation is not the same as a perfect summation. Nor are the rankings supposed to measure who has won more historical trophies or has more historical accomplishments per se. The rankings naturally give much more weight to recent results and older results and accomplishments do eventually lose their significance.

Hence, no one should look at rankings to decide which side from two different confederation is necessarily better or stronger. To some extent, the comparison will fail. Moreover, rankings should never be seen as telling you who is more accomplished historically or has better pedigree. That is just not their function. But if the rankings place Iran above S.Korea at this time, they are telling you something that is not entirely false: that Iran has had better results overall in the past few years than S.Korea. Considering that we just finished ahead of S.Korea in the same World Cup qualifying group, that is obviously not a lie!

3) All that said, I personally don't think much -- except pedigree, confidence, and experience --distinguishes any of the top 13 teams in Asia right now. If I had to give grades to them, Japan aside, the best of them would get a C+ while the number 13 team would still earn a C as well. That is the level of difference I see between them. Even Japan (#1 in the AFC) would not get much better than B-/C+ in my book, while the number 17 team in AFC (Bahrain) would still be around a C.

 

You're right. Sorry. But I still think the goal wasn't so fair. But the penalty that Australia got in the first leg was amazingly undeserved. Nothing happened. Nothing

 

I got a headache from reading this post. Lol

 

^ lawls. You actually read those tl;dr posts?