Ghana places 24th on FIFA rankings to end 2013

Ghana wrap up a remarkable year of World Cup qualification to stay 24th in the last FIFA world ranking released on Thursday for the year 2013.

The Black Stars finished the year as Africa’s second best side behind Ivory Coast with an accumulated point build-up of 849 as the December edition of the rankings did not bring about any significant changes. Algeria and Nigeria Ghana in that order on the continental ranking table.

World champions, Spain are still number one spot as Germany remain in second with Argentina in third.

According to FIFA, the regional competition of the top 50 since December 2012 has recorded some changes.

CONCACAF (five teams in the top 50, plus 2) and CAF (9, plus 1) has increased slightly at the expense of UEFA (26, minus 1), CONMEBOL (8, minus 1) and the AFC (2, minus 1), while the OFC still does not have any teams in the top 50.

Results of 30 international matches were taken into account for the current edition of the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking.

In total in 2013, the results of 918 matches have been taken into account, many of which were friendlies (415) and more than a third of which (347) were qualifying matches for the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Source: Ghana FA