European champions Spain remained top of the latest world rankings published by FIFA yesterday following a quiet month for international football.

January's rankings took into account the 27 senior international matches played so far this year as well as 20 matches played in the second half of December 2008.

With few teams in action, the top 14 stayed unchanged as Spain stretched their spell at the top into a seventh month with Germany and Netherlands their nearest challengers.

The only climbers in the top 20 were Egypt (15th, up 1) and Nigeria (17th, up 2).

Costa Rica (47th, up 6) were the only team currently in the top 50 to have risen more than five places, thus earning a place among the world's 50 best teams for the first time since July 2007.

Lithuania were the only other team to move into the top 50, while the other movers in the rankings were predominantly from Asia or Africa.

Malta began 2009 ranked 148th, down one place from last month. The national team have 151 points.

Fellow UEFA minnows, like Armenia, Estonia, Luxembourg, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, are all placed above Malta in the January list.

Latest rankings

(previous positions in brackets)

1. (1) Spain 1,663 points
2. (2) Germany 1,389
3. (3) Netherlands 1,338
4. (4) Italy 1,326
5. (5) Brazil 1,246
6. (6) Argentina 1,180
7. (7) Croatia 1,142
8. (8) England 1,115
9. (9) Russia 1,103
10. (10) Turkey 1,016
11. (11) France 1,007
11. (11) Portugal 1,007
11. (11) Czech Republic 1,007
14. (14) Cameroon 989
15. (16) Egypt 974
16. (15) Ukraine 909
17. (19) Nigeria 891
18. (17) Paraguay 889
19. (18) Israel 877
20. (20) Greece 872

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