RANKING IN WORLD FOOTBALL & INDIA

We all know that our country is ranked 145 presently according to FIFA/COCA COLA ranking published last month. Everyone talks about poor ranking of Indian football team. Before talking about India & it’s true positions in football world let’s have a look how points are calculated in FIFA world ranking.

Calculation of points for a single match

The number of points that can be won in a match depends on the following factors:

• Was the match won or drawn? (M)

• How important was the match (ranging from a friendly match to a FIFA World Cup match)? (I)

• How strong was the opposing team in terms of ranking position and the confederation to which they

belong? (T and C)

These factors are brought together in the following formula to ascertain the total number of points (P).

P = M x I x T x C

The following criteria apply to the calculation of points:

M: Points for match result

Teams gain 3 points for a victory, 1 point for a draw and 0 points for a defeat. In a penalty shoot-out, the

winning team gains 2 points and the losing team gains 1 point.

I: Importance of match

Friendly match (including small competitions): I = 1.0

FIFA World Cup™ qualifier or confederation-level qualifier: I = 2.5

Confederation-level final competition or FIFA Confederations Cup: I = 3.0

FIFA World Cup™ final competition: I = 4.0

T: Strength of opposing team

The strength of the opponents is based on the formula: 200 – the ranking position of the opponents

As an exception to this formula, the team at the top of the ranking is always assigned the value 200 and the

teams ranked 150th and below are assigned a minimum value of 50. The ranking position is taken from the

opponents’ ranking in the most recently published FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking.

C: Strength of confederation

When calculating matches between teams from different confederations, the mean value of the

confederations to which the two competing teams belong is used. The strength of a confederation is

calculated on the basis of the number of victories by that confederation at the last three FIFA World Cup™

competitions. Their values are as follows:

UEFA/CONMEBOL 1.00

CONCACAF 0.88

CAF 0.86

AFC/OFC 0.85

            
        So it is clear that until & unless we start playing international friendly matches regularly our ranking will not be improved. Playing occasionally in world cup qualifiers & other qualifiers will not help much to increase rank. And to avoid conflict between clubs & AIFF regarding release of players for national team, we need to schedule our football calendar according to international football calendar. Presently we have so many state leagues & short duration tournament like Durand Cup, IFA Shield it is very difficult to schedule I league accordingly. Now days AIFF started appointing soccer / sports management professionals in helm. So we can expect that a proper calendar will be done.

             You may ask why I am so much worried about ranking. If we improve our rank our top players can get work permit to play in Europe or other soccer developed nations. In recent past Sunil Chettry got a chance to play for Coventry City but could not play because British FA does not give work permit for players from countries ranked higher than 100. It will help us to be seeded in a tournament that we can avoid tough opponents in earlier stage of the tournaments. We have lots of international matches to be played in near future. Hope we will win some of them and improve our rank for the better.