Newly-crowned Asian champions Qatar have climbed to 55th in the latest FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking, gaining 38 places—and reaching their best position since 1993, on the back of their recent and stunning UAE success.

The AFC Asian Cup has been responsible almost all of the notable changes in this, the first Ranking of 2019, with the scarcity of games in other confederations leaving the top 20 unchanged—and Belgium still in pole position.

Further down the table, Qatar isn’t the only team to have ascended in spectacular style. Fellow finalists Japan (27th, up 23) have also soared up the order, while Korea Republic (38th, up 15), United Arab Emirates (67th, up 12) and Jordan (97th, up 12) all registered double-digit gains. There were also significant upwards moves by the likes of Iraq (80th, up 8), IR Iran (22nd, up 7) and Uzbekistan (89th, up 6).

In the Asian continent alone, Qatar was placed on the 5th spot with blockading neighbours UAE and Saudi Arabi occupying the 6th and 7th spots, respectively.

Another consequence of these changes is that Asia has boosted its numbers in the Ranking’s top 50. The AFC is now represented by four teams, up one on the last edition, and now stands level with Africa, whose numbers have been depleted by Congo DR (51st, down 2) dropping out.

Apart from being the biggest climber, Qatar also has the largest number of games and the biggest leap in the number of centers from the newly-released FIFA World Ranking.

The next FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking will be published less than two months from now—on April 4, 2019.

(Source)

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Sonkie

Content writer

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