There has been a change in the leadership of the world rankings, with the Netherlands ending Spain’s reign of more than a year at the summit to claim top spot for the first time ever.
The Oranje thus profited from Spain’s defeat by Italy – in a friendly that cost the world and European champions valuable points – to become only the seventh team (after Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy and Spain) to sit atop the global football ladder.
There has also been a dramatic change in South America, with fifth-placed Uruguay becoming the top-ranked South American team following Brazil’s (6th, down 2) loss to Germany (3rd).
England also reaped the rewards of Brazil’s defeat to move up two places to fourth.
Also inside the top 50, Russia (13th, up 5), Nigeria (38th, up 5) and Algeria (46th, up 6) are the biggest gainers. Like the Dutch, Mongolia (160th, up 3) have achieved their highest position since the introduction of the FIFA world rankings.
Malta moved up six places in the latest list following the 2-1 win over the Central African Republic earlier this month.
Two goals from Michael Mifsud earned the Maltese a morale-boosting victory over the Africans who have now slid 15 places in the list. RCA are placed 104th.
Seventy-six ‘A’ matches have been held in the past few weeks, 60 of which were friendlies. Fifteen games were Asian zone qualifiers for the 2014 FIFA World Cup, and one was a EURO 2012 preliminary round match.
Meanwhile, for this edition of the FIFA rankings, the confederation weighting for the AFC has been increased from 0.85 to 0.86 back-dated to August 2010, after a review of the confederation weighting calculation found that 0.86 is the correct figure.
This alteration has led to only minimal changes for a few teams, and would have had no impact whatsoever on the seedings for the preliminary draw for Brazil 2014 held on July 30.
Top 20 positions
1. Holland 1,596; 2. Spain 1,563; 3. Germany 1,330; 4. England 1,177; 5. Uruguay 1,174; 6. Brazil 1,156; 7. Italy 1,110; 8. Portugal 1,060; 9. Argentina 1,017; 10. Croatia 1,009; 11. Chile 960; 12. Norway 943; 13. Russia 940; 14. Greece 937; 15. Ivory Coast 918; 15. France 918; 15. Japan 918; 18. Sweden 889; 19. Montenegro 875; 20. Mexico 864.