Nigeria’s ill fortunes in the monthly global rankings by world soccer governing body, FIFA, continued on Thursday, as footballlive.ng can report that the Super Eagles were able to rise only one spot to 48th position in the latest ratings announced by the assessors.
Despite an emphatic 3-0 win away to Seychelles in their first match after the 2018 World Cup in Russia, FIFA have deemed Nigeria only good enough for a minimal climb on the log, but the Eagles are now fifth in Africa.
The Eagles were global 49 in August, but are now Africa’s fifth best football national team behind Tunisia (23rd in the world), Senegal (25th), DR Congo (40th) and Morocco (45th).
Nigeria’s 2019 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying foes, South Africa, Libya and Seychelles are ranked as 73rd, 99th and 189th respectively; while their last opponents at the World Cup, Argentina, winners of the Mundial in 1978 and 1986 are 11th in the FIFA ranking table.
On the global scale, Belgium joined world champions France as joint leaders of the FIFA rankings, making it the first time in the table’s 25-year history that the top spot has been shared.
Belgium notched up a pair of wins, including victory over Iceland in the inaugural Nations League to move level with the French, who beat them in the World Cup semi-finals.
World champions, France, and Belgium are the joint ranked best team in number one by FIFA followed by Brazil (3), Croatia (4), Uruguay (5), England (6), Portugal (7), Switzerland (8), Spain (9), Denmark (10).
The only other change in the top 10 sees Denmark (10th, down one place) slip below Spain (9th, unchanged).
Outside the top ten, two UEFA Nations League wins for Ukraine (29th, up six) over Czech Republic (47th, down three) and Slovakia (26th, unchanged) make them the month’s biggest movers.
Similarly, Germany (12th, up three) have started to edge back towards a single-figure ranking after their World Cup debacle.
