By Chidera Akalonu
The Super Eagles have dropped to sixth in Africa behind Egypt, Senegal, Democratic Republic of Congo, Tunisia and Cameroon respectively as against Nigeria’s fourth position in the continent in June.
The rankings table on FIFA’s website on Thursday indicated that Nigeria now has 715 points as against 730 it had in the June rankings.
The ranking also saw the national team become 39th spot from 38th in the July FIFA World Rankings following a dismal 2-0 defeat to South Africa in an Africa Cup of Nations qualifier.
Having failed to qualify for the 2017 AFCON staged in Gabon, they are now in real danger of missing out on a spot in the 2019 edition billed for Cameroon and are down to 35th in the rankings.
Bafana Bafana moved up in the FIFA Rankings for the first time since the start of 2017 and are now ranked 64th in the world.
The South African national team have spent the entire year moving between 60th and 65th, dropping from 60th in January to 62nd in March, 64th in April and then 65th in June, however, for July there has been a minor improvement.
Victory over Nigeria last month will no doubt have helped Bafana’s cause, however, defeat to Zambia and Tanzania meant that they picked up no rankings points for those games.
Meanwhile Germany have returned to the top of the pile for the first time in two years following their Confederation Cup triumph with Brazil and Argentina sitting in second and third place respectively. Andorra were the biggest movers in regards to points – up 177 – and are the biggest movers in terms of rankings – up 57.
They joined the likes of Peru, Northern Island, Congo DR, Curacao, Mauritania, Poland and Iceland in registering their highest positions to date.
The next Fifa/Coca-Cola World Ranking will be published on 10 August 2017.