Defeat at Wembley will make Scotland the best home nation

The latest FIFA Rankings were published today, and England sit in lowly fifteenth place (down from ninth last month), while Scotland have climbed a spot to reach sixteenth.

The drop has occured because the rankings are calculated by the last four year’s of results, and England’s relatively solid Euro 2004 performance has just fallen out of range. The biggest concern for England fans, however, is that Scotland could overtake them if they fail to beat the Czech Republic at Wembley on August 20th. On the same day, the Scots are hosting Northern Ireland, and only a victory against the Czechs will ensure the chaps from above Hadrian’s Wall don’t jump ahead in the rankings for the first time since 1995.

On the one hand, this is a potentially huge embarrassment for the English. On the other, the FIFA rankings are an irrelevant waste of time and nobody cares.

National team are better than Holland and Portugal, apparently

Despite not qualifying for that big tournament thing that’s happening at the moment, the English national side have jumped from eleventh to ninth place on the FIFA World Rankings. Bizarrely, Capello’s men have have switched places Portugal. You know, the side who did qualify for Euro 2008 and who won their group:

1. Argentina 1559
2. Brazil 1513
3. Italy 1424
4. Spain 1303
5. Germany 1274
6. Czech Republic 1246
7. France 1143
8. Greece 1133
9. England 1123
10. Netherlands 1111

We’ve probably earned some points by defeating low-ranked teams like Trinidad & Tobago, but how does this put us above the Netherlands and Portugal? Does anyone even care about FIFA rankings? Why is there a light in the fridge but not in the freezer? Why is ‘abbreviated’ such a long word? So many questions, so little time…

[soccerway]