Football: Fifa world ranking |16 February 2022

SEYCHELLES … 196th on the Fifa world ranking

Seychelles remain in 196th place

When many African countries have moved up places on the Fédération internationale de Football Association world ranking released earlier this month, Seychelles’ position has remained unchanged on the first ranking of 2022.

With 873.71 points, Seychelles are in 196th place on the Fédération internationale de Football Association (Fifa) world ranking and 53rd in the 54-nation Confederation of African Football (Caf) ranking.

The lowest-ranked African nation is Eritrea with 855.56 points and it occupies the 202nd position on the Fifa ranking.

Africa has only one team in the top-20 worldwide with Senegal, the continent’s number one football nation, moving from 20th to 18th position after their triumph at the just-concluded rescheduled African Cup of Nations played in Cameroon. Senegal boast 1587.78 points.

Losing finalists in 2019, Senegal needed a penalty shootout to beat record seven-time winners Egypt 4-2 on penalties (0-0 after normal time and extra-time) at the Olembe Stadium in Yaoundé. This was the third appearance of the Teranga Lions of Senegal in the Afcon final. Winning the trophy was a special moment for coach Aliou Cissé since he was the team’s captain and missed the decisive penalty in a shootout when they lost the 2002 Afcon. Cissé was also coach for the 2019 disappointment.

The 33rd Afcon was scheduled to be played in 2021 but was twice postponed and it finally took place in Cameroon this year.

Africa's next best team are Morocco who slot in at 24th and they are followed by Nigeria who have moved up four places to be ranked 32nd. The other two countries to make significant strides are Cameroon and Egypt. Afcon 2021(22) runners-up Egypt moved from 44th to 34th, while Cameroon's 'Indomitable Lions’ who took third place overall, jumped from 54th to 38th.

Algeria is the African country to make the biggest drop on the latest rankings. The two-time Afcon champs are 14 places lower at 43rd. After lifting the 2019 Afcon title, Algeria were dumped out of the 2022 showpiece when they failed to advance beyond the group stage.

Mali occupy the 48th position and Ivory Coast are in 51st spot. Other African countries in the top 100 bracket are Burkina Faso in 56th, Ghana in 61st, Democratic Republic of Congo in 66th, South Africa in 68th, and Cape Verde occupy the 73rd position.

Nicknamed ‘Les Diables Rouges’ or the Red Devils, Belgium, the 2018 World Cup bronze medallists, still top the world football standings with 1828.45 points.

They are followed in second place by record World Cup winners Brazil with 1823.42 points.

Defending World Cup champions France are third in the ranking as ‘Les Bleus’ (the Blues) bagged 1786.15 points. Argentina are in fourth, while England and Italy occupy the fifth and sixth positions respectively.

Spain are in the seventh position, Portugal eighth, Denmark ninth and the Netherlands 10th.

According to Fifa, standings on the ranking named ‘SUM’ relies on adding and subtracting points won or lost for a game to and from the previous point totals rather than averaging game points over a given time period as in the previous version of the world ranking for all the countries.

The points, according to Fifa, are added or subtracted and are partially determined by the relative strength of the two opponents, including the logical expectation that teams higher in the ranking should fare better against teams lower in the ranking.

Gerard Govinden