The FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking takes into account the showing of the teams over the last four years. Each team is awarded points based on its showing against top ranked nations as well.

Brazil and World Cup winners Italy occupied the second and third spots respectively. Nigeria was the only major country to see any significant improvement jumping to the 19th spot from the 20th it occupied last month. A decent showing in the upcoming African Cup of Nations may see many countries improve their rankings.

Other teams in the top 10 included Spain, Germany, the Czech Republic, France, Portugal, the Netherlands and Croatia  Egypt and Tunisia also made significant progress with the defending African Nations Cup champions moving to the 35th spot, while Tunisia moved to the 46th position. Greece was 11th, while England was 12th in the rankings.

European teams dominated the rankings, with 28 teams in the top 50 followed by 10 African nations. South America has 6 countries in the top 50, while Asia had four representatives. North and Central America and the Caribbean had two nations in the top 50.

Introduced in August 1993, the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking "has become a regular part of international sports reports and an important indicator for FIFA's member associations to find out where their respective teams stand in world football's pecking order and how they are progressing," FIFA said.
 

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