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The rankings obtained are, unsurprisingly, the subject of considerable debate, in particular, the relatively high position of the USA. They are based on performances over an eight year period, which means that teams with consistent good performances are highly ranked, but on the other hand the rankings are fairly slow to respond significantly to changes in form. A number of alternative systems have been devised, such as the World Football Elo Ratings , based on the Elo Rating System used in chess. The UFWC (Unofficial Football World Championships) ranks teams on an all-time basis. Interestingly, FIFA does not use the same formula to determine its Rankings For Women's Football . The women's rankings are based on a procedure which is a simplified version of the Football Elo Ratings. {Link without Title} TOP 20 RANKING AS OF APRIL 2006 HISTORY In August 1993 FIFA introduced a ranking system for senior national teams. The system allows for a comparison of the relative strengths of international teams at regular intervals. Since its introduction, the FIFA world ranking has been used as a measure for comparing national senior teams. Since its introduction some of the details of the ranking process have proved to be in need of improvement, and a revised version was put into effect at the beginning of 1999 . However, this system is still considered inferior to the Elo Rating s. OVERVIEW The following is an overview of the system used to calculate the rankings. The FIFA World Ranking includes the national senior teams of all FIFA member associations who play international matches. Matches played by junior teams or other representative national sides (such as the women's national team) are not included in the calculation. The following are taken into consideration for the ranking are all international senior match results over a time span of the last eight years:
The ranking list is produced by a computer program which assigns a team points for every match, according to clearly defined criteria. The factors taken into consideration are:
''Note: The system does not take into account margin of victory or loss'' Only the seven best results per year for each team are given full weighting, also progressively less weighting is given to past results year by year until after eight years they are dropped completely. This means that current success is rated more highly than past results. Two awards are given at the end of each year. The Team of the Year goes to the team that notches up the overall highest average number of points during the year over the seven matches of the year. ''' Best Mover Of The Year ''' is the nation that has made the best progress up the rankings over the course of the previous twelve months, this is not simply the team that has made the biggest jump up the rankings in the last 12 months, and the fact that it becomes progressively harder to earn points the higher ranked you are, is taken into account when calculating this. BASIC CALCULATION PRINCIPLES The basic idea behind the FIFA World Rankings is the same as that for a normal league format championship: a team can potentially win a certain number of points for each match, depending on the result of the match, this number will be higher or lower, and the points are totalled. The association with the highest total is at the top of the ranking list. However the World Rankings differ from normal league championships, for in the World Ranking the points a team receives for a match do not depend solely on whether they win, lose or draw, but Also affecting the total for a match will be the number of goals scored and conceded, the venue and the importance of the match. In addition, the strength of the opponent is considered; therefore a win over a weak opponent will earn fewer points than one against a strong one. This means that a win will not simply bring two or three points and a draw one, as would happen in a national league. The calculation is more complicated since it incorporates the other factors which were mentioned above. To make the ranking list more understandable, the 1999 revision has been "scaled up". Previously, a win could earn between one and three points; now the scale has been multiplied by ten, so a win can bring between ten and thirty points, according to the opponent. The overall totals of teams in the list will from now on range from 0 up to about 800 points. Winning, drawing or losing A win will bring more points than a defeat in any system, but FIFA believe simply giving two or three points for a win, one for a draw and none for a defeat, would not fully meet all the requirements for a reliable world-wide ranking system. For this reason the distribution of points also takes into consideration the relative strengths of the two teams. In practice this means that a win over a weaker opponent will earn fewer points than victory over an equally rated or stronger one. It has also been made possible for a weak team that plays well against a stronger one to earn points in defeat - though as a general rule not as many as the stronger team that beat them. A special exception is made for matches that are decided on penalties; the winning team earns the full number of points for a win, while the losing team gets the number of points that would have been awarded for a draw. Number of goals A further factor taken into consideration is the number of goals scored and conceded in a match. Here too the distribution of these points depends on the relative strengths of the two teams. In other words, a goal scored by the lower-rated team will be weighted more than one scored by the higher-rated side. On the other side of the balance sheet, points are deducted for goals conceded. To encourage attacking football with more goals, goals conceded are weighted less than goals scored. In matches decided on penalties, only goals scored during regular playing time or extra time are considered in the calculation. A possible "overweighting" of goals is avoided by attaching more importance to the first goal that a team scores than to any subsequent ones. This means that the number of goals scored can never earn as many points as would be awarded for a win. This is in accordance with the general principle that while more goals may make the result look more impressive it is winning or losing that is decisive (as in normal league championships). Home and away games To make an allowance for the extra handicap of playing away from home, the away-team is awarded the small bonus of 3 points. For games played on neutral territory or during World Cup final rounds there are no bonus points. ''Note: Any teams playing the host of a tournament effectively get bonus 3 points for playing, over other teams not playing the hosts, to whom it is neutral ground.'' Status of a match The importance of a game is also considered - a World Cup encounter is weighted more heavily than a friendly match. The method applied here is to use a pre-calculated factor by which the points totals of a given match are multiplied.The factors used are: The result of this is that qualifying matches are weighted 50% higher than friendlies, continental final round matches 75 % higher and matches during World Cup finals twice as much. Regional strength factors It is accepted that there are differences in strength between the various continents. To take these into account in an objective manner, weighting factors are worked out each year for each of the confederations. The basis of evaluation for each continent is the performance of its teams in direct intercontinental encounters. At the end of every year a continental ranking list is calculated, based on the same criteria as used for the FIFA World Ranking. Taken into consideration are not all the intercontinental matches played by teams from a given continent, but only the direct confrontations between the strongest teams from each continent. Specifically this means that what is included are matches between the best 25 per cent of the teams from a given continent (with a minimum of 5 teams being considered). This way the danger is averted of errors possibly being introduced by considering matches between strong teams of a weak confederation against weak teams of a strong one. The weightings are applied in the form of multiplication factors for teams from the same continent (see below). If teams from two different confederations are involved then the factor applied is the average of the two continental weightings. For 2005, the following weighting factors will apply: Summary Based on the above considerations, the total number of points credited to a team after a match will depend on the following criteria: Where:
( ''w'' + ''g'' + ''a'' − ''c'' ) ''s'' ''r'' = ''m'' The number of points for a win, draw or loss, as well as for the number of goals scored or conceded is dependent on the strength of the opponent. In order not to punish a lack of success too severely, a negative points total is rounded up to 0.00. Examples The same examples have been used on the Elo Football Rating s for a fair comparison. Some actual examples should help to make the methods of calculation clear. In this instance it is assumed that three teams of different strengths are involved in a small friendly tournament on neutral territory. For the sake of clarity no away team bonus, nor continental or status multiplication factors are applied. Before the tournament the three team have the following point totals: Thus, team A is by some distance the highest ranked of the three: The following table shows the points allocations based on three possible outcomes of the match between the strongest team A, and the somewhat weaker team B: Example 1 Team A versus Team B (Team A stronger than Team B) From the table it can be seen that in the case of a 3:1 win, team A is allocated a total of 21.0 points. But as the more highly ranked team, the win itself only earns 17.4 of these. The lower-rated team B still earns 1.7 points. Had the "weaker" team B won the match 3:1, they would have received 27.2 points, while the then negative total for team A would have been rounded up to 0.00. For a 2:2 draw, team B would have earned a few points more than A, for being the lower-rated team. Example 2 Team B versus Team C (both teams approximately the same strength) When the difference in strength between the two teams is less, so also will be the difference in points allocation. The following table illustrates how the points would be divided following the same results as above, but with two roughly equally ranked teams, B and C, being involved: In this case, it can be seen that for either team, approximately the same number of points would be awarded for a win or a draw, with team C getting slightly more since they are ranked a little lower. There would normally be a bonus for the away team, which would be added to the above. Then the total would be multiplied by weighting factors that take into account the importance of the match and the regional strengths. Thus, for example, if the games above had been played during a World Cup final round, then the points total would first be doubled, and then multiplied by the continental weighting factor for the two teams involved. Comparison with Elo Ratings Assuming team B drew with team A and lost to team C the table now stands (decimals rounded); As you can see, as the criticism suggests, the FIFA rankings have been slow to respond to Team Bs considerable drop in form, with despite Team Cs Underdog victory, the margin between it and Team B is still ten points, whereas in the Elo rankings, team C has overtaken team B. Also in the FIFA rankings, team A despite having drawn with a team significantly lower ranked than itself, has still gained 8 points, whereas in the Elo rankings has lost 4. Further Criteria To obtain a greater degree of objectivity in the ranking list, two further criteria have to be considered:
The number of matches played So that teams playing more international matches are not favoured over those playing fewer, only a limited number of games are taken into consideration. This number has been determined by deciding on what could be termed the "averagely active teams", and these were agreed on as those having played between seven and ten matches per year. So that less active teams are not disadvantaged in the ranking, the calculation initially considers only the seven best results. Further results are included, by working out an average for them. The situation is best clarified by means of an example. Suppose a team plays twelve matches; then the calculation would run like this:
Previous results So that the ranking accurately reflects current form, the greatest importance is attached to matches played in the last twelve months. But attention is also paid to results from previous years. Basically, the current year's points total is averaged in with points earned in the seven preceding years, with weightings that decline progressively the further back we go. After eight years, results are dropped from the calculation altogether. Thus the points included in the calculations for the ranking at the end of 2005 would comprise the following: Last 12 months (e.g. 2005) : 8/8 value + previous year (2004) : 7/8 value + previous year (2003) : 6/8 value + previous year (2002) : 5/8 value + previous year (2001) : 4/8 value + previous year (2000) : 3/8 value + previous year (1999) : 2/8 value + previous year (1998) : 1/8 value Awards The ''Team of the Year'' goes to the team whose most productive seven matches of the year reap the highest overall average points during the year. The award for the "Best Mover of the Year" in the FIFA World Ranking is not based simply on the biggest jump in the number of points or in the number of places up the ranking ladder. What also has to be taken into consideration is the fact that it becomes progressively harder for a team to earn points the more it already has. Thus to decide on the " Best Mover of the Year " a calculation is performed that multiplies the number of points a team has at the end of the year by the number it has earned during the year [''y'' . The team with the highest index obtained in this way wins the award. The table below shows the calculation for the year 2002. The Computer Program The program for calculating and up-dating the FIFA World Ranking was developed by two specialists for FIFA, they were Dr. Markus Lamprecht and Dr. Hanspeter Stamm . The development of the program (including the 1999 revisions) was carried out in close co-operation with football experts, and the Communications and Competitions Divisions of FIFA. SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
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