I've never understood the FIFA World Rankings. Teams move up and down with seemingly no rhyme or reason, and teams that are clearly better than others are ranked below them. The fact that this ranking system makes absolutely no sense was once again brought to my attention by loyal blog reader Steve Misevic, who informed me that the United States moved up five places after finishing fourth at the Gold Cup, and World Cup champion Germany somehow dropped behind Belgium to third in the world. (And Argentina stayed No. 1 despite losing the Copa America final.)
Belgium's good, but they're not the second-best team in the world. And they're definitely not better than Germany. Germany won the World Cup last year! There hasn't been a major tournament since then, and all of the European teams (except France) are currently in the midst of qualifying for Euro 2016. So where'd Belgium get all these extra points from? And speaking of France, since they don't have to qualify for Euro 2016, they don't have qualifying games to count for their world ranking. As a result, they've dropped to 23rd in the world. Albania is 22nd! Need I say more.
Yet, for some reason, FIFA relies almost exclusively on these rankings (instead of using common sense) as a means of seeding teams for its various tournaments, which is completely absurd. They used the July rankings to seed the teams for European qualifying for the 2018 World Cup. That meant Romania and Wales were seeded, while Italy and France weren't. Switzerland, which for some reason got seeded at the actual World Cup last year, is now down to 18th in the world and wasn't seeded, either. But since the world ranking is how they determined who'd be in what pot in the draw, they ended up with Spain and Italy in the same group. Same thing with France and the Netherlands and Portugal and Switzerland. Meanwhile, this is the makeup of another European qualifying group: Wales, Austria, Serbia, Ireland, Moldova, Georgia. One of those six nations is guaranteed a spot in the World Cup.
Last year, of course, I let it be known how stupid I thought it was that the Netherlands (which lost in the finals of both the 2010 World Cup and Euro 2012) and Italy weren't seeded at the World Cup, yet Belgium and Switzerland were. And because they weren't seeded, the Dutch, who ended up finishing third, had to play Spain, which was still the top team in the world at the time, in the opening game. If the purpose of the world rankings is to prevent the top teams from facing each other until the later rounds, how does this happen? Clearly there's a flaw in the system.
Perhaps the biggest problem with the FIFA rankings is that they're incredibly complicated. I was only able to get about halfway down the explanation on Wikipedia before getting extremely confused. From what I was able to gather, though, they go back four years on a weighted system, with more recent results counting more than, say, a 2013 friendly. They also weigh it based on your opponent and what confederation you're in (which is inherently unfair to teams from Oceania, the lowest-ranked confederation). And, of course, what type of match it is also comes into play (World Cup qualifiers count more than friendlies, for example). The only part that I was able to get that was straightforward was the "result" points, which are basically the same as they are for a regular game (the only exception is that you only get two points for a shootout win and you get one for a shootout loss).
There are so many problems with the rankings it's hysterical. For starters, teams are actually indirectly penalized for hosting a tournament. Your points count 2.5 for qualifying matches. Yet, since they don't have to qualify and, thus, don't play any qualifiers, the only international matches that the host can count are friendlies, which count as 1.0 points. That's why France's ranking has dipped to 23, and why Brazil was only ranked 10th going into last year's World Cup.
And teams have found the way to manipulate the system to their benefit. There's no minimum number of matches required, so you can play as few or as many friendlies as you want. Switzerland's being seeded in the 2014 World Cup is a prime example of this. They only played three friendlies in the entire year leading up to the World Cup, all easy wins against lower-ranked opponents. Had they played any more, they wouldn't have been seeded. That's the same way Romania got seeded for 2018 qualifying. The Romanians have played a grand total of one friendly in the last year.
The way I see it, there are easy fixes to these problems. And it would make the whole system a lot simpler in the process. For starters, you eliminate the regional strength multiplier. There's absolutely no reason why European teams should get extra credit for playing other European teams or Oceania teams have it held against them when they play other teams from Oceania, especially since they usually don't have a choice (who else are they gonna play in the Oceania Championships?).
Next, I get rid of the bonus points for beating a team that's ranked higher than you. I get the idea behind it, but the rankings are always in flux. It's also a stretch to call it an "upset" when fifth-ranked Brazil beats fourth-ranked Colombia in Sao Paulo. Most people would expect Brazil to win that game. Why should they get extra ranking points if they do win it? Home/away results used to be included in the system, but FIFA took that out of the criteria in 2006. With good reason. The "quality win" points should be the next to go.
FIFA also really needs to institute some sort of minimum games rule. Depending on the year and what type of regional/global tournament (or qualifying for those events) they might be entered in, national teams have a variable number of "official" games to play. That's not going to change. But FIFA can require them to play a certain minimum number of friendlies. You can play more, but if every nation was required to play, say, at least four friendlies a year, you'd avoid things like Switzerland and Romania manipulating the system to their benefit by not playing.
Lastly, I'd take a page out of tennis' book. In tennis, they have different levels of tournaments, which are worth different amounts of points. The grand slams obviously count the most. It should be the same in soccer. Winning the World Cup should count the most, then winning the Confederations Cup, then winning your regional championship. I'm not saying qualifying and friendlies aren't important, but it's absurd that the World Cup doesn't count more than it does.
Under the current system, FIFA gives you four times the points for a win/draw in the World Cup, three for the Confederations Cup or continental cup, and 2.5 for qualifying. So, a win in the World Cup adds 12 points to your world ranking, a Copa America win adds nine, and a win in qualifying for one of those events is 7.5. But those points are only weighted based on your results. Your actual place in the tournament is irrelevant, which is ridiculous.
If you go 0-3-0 in the World Cup, you don't get any points. The sheer fact that you played in the World Cup should count for something. Again bringing it back to tennis, you get one ranking point for a first-round loss in a grand slam, with it going up for each round (Novak Djokovic got 2000 for winning Wimbledon). And in tennis, points only stay on your ranking for a year.
One of the few things about FIFA's current ranking system that works is the result points. But performance points have to be added in there, too. For the World Cup, I'd have it be something like this: Group play-50 points, Round of 16-75 points, Quarterfinals-100 points, Fourth place-125 points, Third place-150 points, Second place-250 points, Champion-400 points. Plus your result points, like you receive now. Those automatically stay on your ranking until the next World Cup, but the minimum you get would be 50 for simply being in the tournament.
For the Euro or other continental tournament it would be: Group play-25 points, Round of 16 (Euro only)-40 points, Quarterfinals-50 points, Semifinals (if no third place game)-80 points, Fourth place-75 points, Third place-100 points, Second place-150 points, Champion-250 points.
Using the bonus point system I just proposed, Germany would've received 476 points for winning the World Cup (400 for winning the tournament, 12 for each of their six wins, four for the draw with Portugal). Argentina would have 520 performance points after its second-place finishes at the World Cup (318) and Copa America (202).
Teams should be rewarded for a good performance at a major tournament. That's the whole point of world rankings, isn't it? To determine the best teams? Unfortuantely, the FIFA World Rankings don't currently do that. Maybe when the new president takes over, he'll do something to fix that.
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