FIFA World Rankings: INDIA drop to 169th, worst ever ranking

The world football governing body FIFA released the latest FIFA World Rankings earlier today in which India has lost one spot to be now ranked 169th amongst the 209 ranked nations and territories, while within Asia India remains 32nd amongst 46 nations in the rankings.

This is India's worst-ever ranking since it was launched! India is 169th in the world rankings behind Indonesia and ahead of neighbours Bangladesh with 105 points, one point less then in last months ranking.

Though India did win the Nehru Cup on Sunday, but the tournament matches in regard to the world rankings is just calculated as an international friendly and the Cameroon matches were not counted as all as Cameroon did not play the tournament with their 'A' national team. Also India lost the points it had in the ranking of their 2008 AFC Challenge Cup final 4-1 victory against Tajikistan.

It is clear that the AIFF needs to utilise as many FIFA match dates as possible, but also win matches in FIFA World Cup and AFC Asian Cup qualifiers otherwise the rankings will not rise.

Amongst the South Asian nations India remain fourth behind the Maldives (159th), Afghanistan (165th), Nepal (166th), but ahead of Bangladesh (170th), Pakistan (177th), Sri Lanka (179st) and Bhutan (206th).

Meanwhile there has been only one change amongst the top five of the FIFA World Rankings. World champions Spain (1,617 points) stay at the top with Germany (1,437) remaining second and England (1,274) third with Portugal (1,232) and Uruguay (1,217) exchanging spots.