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Friday, December 6, 2013

2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying draw seeding for UEFA (6 December 2013)

Assumptions:

- UEFA will keep the current qualifying system
- FIFA will use the FIFA ranking to seed the teams
- UEFA will choose the July 2015 ranking for seeding


The July 2015 FIFA ranking will include matches played between July 2011 and July 2015. This means we're currently in the 0.5 time frame and things will start to get interesting.

This the July 2015 ranking (for UEFA only) using matches played up to and including December 5th, 2013 and matches scheduled up to July 2014 (only those on fifa.com).

The "0.5" part is computed this way: points gained / (number of matches played + scheduled).

Looking to improve your FIFA ranking before the draw? Use the e-mail address from my profile to contact me.

Changes since the last update:

Portugal and Ukraine replace Netherlands and Bosnia-Herzegovina in pot 1.
Croatia and Scotland replace Romania and Serbia in pot 2.
Slovakia replace Finland in pot 3.
Montenegro and Republic of Ireland replace Northern Ireland and Israel in pot 4.

Pot 1: Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Greece, Portugal, Belgium, Italy, Ukraine, England
Pot 2: France, Netherlands, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Armenia, Scotland, Sweden, Denmark, Slovenia
Pot 3: Romania, Serbia, Iceland, Turkey, Czech Republic, Hungary, Wales, Austria, Slovakia
Pot 4: Finland, FYR Macedonia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Montenegro, Albania, Norway, Poland, Republic of Ireland
Pot 5: Northern Ireland, Israel, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Belarus, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Georgia
Pot 6: Kazakhstan, Cyprus, Malta, Liechtenstein, Faroe Islands, Andorra, San Marino

Rank -Previous Rank - Team - Points

 1  1 Switzerland          648
 2  3 Germany              611
 3  2 Spain                610
 4  7 Greece               593
 5 12 Portugal             588
 6  4 Belgium              540
 7  5 Italy                522
 8 13 Ukraine              486
 9  6 England              481
------------------------------
10 14 France               472
11  8 Netherlands          467
12 20 Croatia              460
13  9 Bosnia-Herzegovina   442
14 10 Armenia              419
15 19 Scotland             411
15 11 Sweden               411
17 16 Denmark              409
18 15 Slovenia             403
------------------------------
19 18 Romania              389
20 17 Serbia               378
21 23 Iceland              367
22 25 Turkey               364
23 22 Czech Republic       354
24 21 Hungary              349
25 24 Wales                344
26 26 Austria              329
27 29 Slovakia             290
------------------------------
28 27 Finland              283
29 28 FYR Macedonia        267
30 33 Moldova              235
31 32 Azerbaijan           231
32 37 Montenegro           228
32 34 Albania              228
34 30 Norway               225
34 31 Poland               225
36 38 Republic of Ireland  221
------------------------------
37 35 Northern Ireland     208
38 36 Israel               207
39 39 Bulgaria             194
40 42 Estonia              188
41 40 Latvia               171
42 41 Belarus              169
43 43 Lithuania            157
44 44 Luxembourg           130
45 45 Georgia              119
------------------------------
45 45 Kazakhstan           119
47 47 Cyprus                90
48 48 Malta                 86
49 49 Liechtenstein         34
50 50 Faroe Islands         14
51 51 Andorra               11
52 52 San Marino             0

About me:

Christian, husband, father x 3, programmer, Romanian. Started the blog in March 2007. Quit in April 2018. You can find me on LinkedIn.

7 comments:

  1. I hope that FIFA decides to revise their ranking system after next summer's World Cup (just as they revised in after the 2006 World Cup). A few simple tweaks would go a long way: (1) Eliminate weighting results by year and instead consider all matches over the 4-year period to be averaged together. (2) The "I" in the formula for importance (1.0 for a friendly and 4.0 for a World Cup final) should factor into the averaging (in Excel this would be SUMPRODUCT) such that total points for all matches are divided by the sum of the I's (instead of a straight average), so that if a team gets 1200 points from a World Cup win and 200 points from a friendly then these 1400 points would be divided by 5. Note that these tweaks would remove some of the "momentum" from the current process while increasing the impact of the most recent World Cup into the rankings (which I think is good).

    If anyone was interested, it would be interesting to see what these tweaks would have done to the October 2013 rankings.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I like your proposal for the ranking.

      Although you should know that the next world cup will be during winter, not summer. In june/july it's gonna be winter in Brazil, except for the northern parts close to the Equator, where there are no seasons year round.

      Juan (Arg.)

      Delete
  2. Dorian,

    Here's the top-30 of the October 2013 ranking calculated with no time frame weighting (each time frame has a weight of 1.0) and the sum of match points divided by the sum of I's over the matches played instead of the number of matches played. In parentheses the difference in position compared to the real October ranking.

    1 Spain 1555 (-)
    2 Germany 1382 (-)
    2 Brazil 1382 (+9)
    4 Argentina 1364 (-1)
    5 Netherlands 1231 (+3)
    6 England 1117 (+4)
    7 Belgium 1100 (-2)
    8 Italy 1088 (-)
    9 Chile 1084 (+3)
    10 Colombia 1080 (-6)
    11 Uruguay 1075 (-5)
    12 Switzerland 1071 (-5)
    13 Portugal 1061 (+1)
    14 Croatia 1040 (+4)
    15 Greece 1006 (-)
    16 Sweden 976 (+9)
    17 Russia 971 (+2)
    18 France 965 (+3)
    19 Denmark 943 (+7)
    19 Norway 943 (+28)
    21 Mexico 920 (+3)
    22 USA 913 (-9)
    23 Ukraine 889 (-3)
    24 Cote d'Ivoire 879 (-7)
    25 Ecuador 858 (-3)
    26 Peru 857 (+13)
    27 Bosnia-Herzegovina 845 (-11)
    28 Serbia 802 (-)
    29 Egypt 801 (+22)
    30 Panama 788 (+6)

    It looks a bit more balanced and indeed less 'momentum-prone' (if that is an English word). Belgium still right up between the seeds by the way. The Netherlands, England and Italy would be seeded instead of Colombia, Uruguay and Switzerland.

    The value of the current string of 22 consecutive competitive matches without a loss for England is obvious here. The first non European/South American team would be Mexico at 21st spot.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ed, thank you very much for these calculations! I too find them a bit more balanced. It's good to see Brazil would be much higher. I also feel the top 8 would make better seeds. It also points out how the second 8 (teams ranked 9-16) probably deserve a 9-16 seeding along with the 1-8 seeds. A little surprised to see Mexico above the USA based on the hex and Gold Cup, but we all know that Mexico is a strong team that has had a weak couple of years (they did win the Olympics!).

      Thank you again.

      Delete
    2. I too like this and as I suggested in another thread, for the purposes of seedings it should actually be calculated excluding friendlies.

      Delete
    3. I hope FIFA takes a look at this when/if they decide to revise their ranking procedure.

      Delete
  3. Makes a lot more sense for the top seeds! Nice to see my Greece unchanged.

    ReplyDelete