Spain stretch lead over Italy
National team down to 146th in world list
European champions Spain remained top of the world football rankings for a fourth straight month yesterday after extending their lead over world champions Italy.
World Cup qualifying wins over Armenia and Bosnia were enough to keep Vicente Del Bosque's side comfortably clear of the Italians, who also enjoyed qualifying victories over Georgia and Cyprus in the past month.
Brazil climbed above the Netherlands and Croatia into fourth place off the back of their World Cup qualifying draw with Bolivia and away win over Chile.
Scotland's hopes of leapfrogging traditional rivals England, however, evaporated following a shock 1-0 defeat in Macedonia.
After suffering the largest drop of points in this month's rankings, Scotland fell 10 places, to 26th while England's win over Croatia helped Fabio Capello's team climb one spot to 14th.
The latest ranking list makes unpleasant reading for Malta who have fallen to 146th, down 13 places from last month.
Defeats to Portugal (0-4) and Albania (0-3) in their opening 2010 World Cup Group One qualifiers contributed to Malta's slump with the national team now tucked behind fellow small European countries like Luxembourg (123rd), Kazakhstan (131st), Leichtenstein (135th), Estonia (137th) and Azerbaijan (143rd). Malta have a total of 176 points.
The month's biggest winners are unquestionably from Oceania.
On the back of two convincing victories over New Caledonia in their 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign, New Zealand have gained 268 points and are currently ranked 54th. This means the All Whites are once again the highest-ranked OFC team.
Other climbers this month include Israel (16th, up 3), Lithuania (37th, up 17) and FYR Macedonia (46th, up 10), all of whom have recorded their best placing since the rankings were introduced.
A total of 125 international 'A' matches have been played worldwide since the last edition of the ranking, of which 106 were qualifiers for South Africa 2010.
The remaining internationals were qualifiers for the CONCACAF Gold Cup (six matches) and friendlies (13 matches).
Rankings
(previous position in brackets)
1. (1) Spain 1,643
2. (2) Italy 1,365
3. (3) Germany 1,336
4. (6) Brazil 1,280
5. (4) Netherlands 1,258
6. (5) Croatia 1,223
7. (7) Argentina 1,200
8. (8) Czech Republic 1,111
9. (12) Russia 1,076
10. (9) Portugal 1,075
11. (11) France 1,035
12. (14) Cameroon 1,027
13. (10) Turkey 1,021
14. (15) England 982
15. (16) Bulgaria 969
16. (19) Israel 961
17. (18) Greece 945
18. (13) Romania 927
19. (26) Ukraine 893
20. (22) Uruguay 887.