Where does Mexico rank in FIFA after the 2022 World Cup?
Although they were eliminated in the group phase of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, Mexico is projected to place 15th in the latest FIFA team rankings.
FIFA team rankings sometimes cause confusion and astonishment among fans because of the places that some countries occupy. Published monthly, the list that ranks each of the 211 affiliated nations will have changes due to everything that happened in the recently concluded World Cup in Qatar.
Mexico will be ranked number 15, despite being eliminated in the group phase.
It is somewhat surprising that the Tricolor is still among the best 15 teams in the world, ahead of Japan and Senegal who both performed well in the World Cup. These two teams managed to get past the first round but reached their limit in the round of 16, losing to Croatia and England respectively.
Another striking aspect is that the United States, a team that had historically been in the shadow of El Tri in terms of soccer, was placed two positions above Mexico,. However, as has already been demonstrated in recent editions of the Gold Cup, in the qualifiers for Concacaf and in this World Cup, Mexico’s northern neighbor is beginning to gain ground in the sport.
Prior to the 2022 World Cup, Mexico was ranked 13th, while Team USA was in 16th place. The U.S. advanced out of the group stage in Qatar and later fell 3-1 to the Netherlands.
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What is the FIFA ranking used for and how is it calculated?
This list, created in 1992, is a system that evaluates the performance of the teams according to criteria such as the result of the match, its degree of importance (a friendly is not the same as a qualifying round for the World Cup, for example) and how strong the rival was, this taking into account the games played in the previous month.
A team’s total score is calculated by adding the units of the games played in the last twelve months, added to the score tallied just over a year before that period.
Its greatest utility is to determine the seeding of the World Cup.
Brazil still number one
Despite Argentina’s winning the championship, they will still be outranked by Brazil, who will continue to occupy the number one spot in the rankings. Messi’s team is at number two because the match between Argentina and France was decided by a penalty shootout. Prior to that game, the champions also prevailed over the Netherlands in the quarterfinals in the same way.
Victories achieved in this manner garner less ranking points. Croatia defeated Brazil in the quarterfinals, and this victory also came by way of penalty shootout.