…Portugal the sole climbers among top 10, jumping two spots to fifth
…World champions Spain extend lead at summit after clean sweep of UEFA Nations League victories
…Switzerland, who are now 12th, Greece, Mali and South Africa among other notable risers in top 50
…The three-time Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) winners Nigeria drops four places
THUR OCT 08 2026-theGBJournal| While the FIFA World Cup 2026™ remains fresh in the memory, the football world keeps spinning and a total of 338 men’s internationals have been contested since the curtain came down on the global showpiece on 19 July.
The highlights have included a string of UEFA and Concacaf Nations League encounters and CAF Africa Cup of Nations 2027 qualifying bouts, the outcomes of which have made a real mark on the FIFA/Coca-Cola Men’s World Ranking.
World champions Spain have surged further ahead at the top of the pecking order, with second-placed Argentina, the beaten finalists at the FIFA World Cup 2026™, now almost 40 points adrift, while France still occupy the final place on the podium.
However, the standout storyline in the upper echelons comes from Portugal (5th, up 2), who have leapfrogged both Brazil (6th, down 1) and Morocco (7th, also down 1).
Meanwhile, further down the top 20, Switzerland (12th, up 2) have made eye-catching headway by surpassing Germany and Croatia, who have both slipped one spot and now sit 13th and 14th, respectively. Things are looking up for Portugal, Spain and Switzerland in the UEFA Nations League too, as the trio have all kick-started their campaigns with four-match winning streaks.
Among the other main movers and shakers in the top 50 are two African sides in Mali (now 47th) and South Africa (now 48th), who have both soared into this group thanks to six-place rises. Just above them, Greece (41st, up 5) have been rewarded for going four games without defeat.
Les Aigles’ and Bafana Bafana’s exploits have had a knock-on effect on the top-50 breakdown by confederation.
CAF can now lay claim to 10 representatives in this exclusive club, having gained ground on UEFA (24, down 1) and CONMEBOL (8, also down 1), with Czechia (now 51st) and Peru (now 53rd) both having dropped out of this bracket following three-spot drops.
The AFC and Concacaf continue to have four teams apiece among the leading 50 nations, whilst teams from the OFC remain well outside the top-50 nations in the world.
The Africa Cup of Nations qualifying results are also behind many of the other sizeable shifts further down the standings. Rwanda (119th, up 9), Guinea-Bissau (124th, up 8), The Gambia (109th, up 7), Botswana (141st, up 6) and Mozambique (98th, up 5) are among the biggest beneficiaries.
However, the three-time Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) winners Nigeria has dropped four places after a series of poor performances which include not qualifying for the FIFA World Cup 2026™ and 3-0 defeat to Guinea Bissau in their 2027 AFCON qualifiers on September 29, 2026.
Several other teams from around the world have posted impressive advances. These include the Dominican Republic (135th, up 9), Guyana (142nd, up 8), Northern Ireland (64th, up 6), Estonia (122nd, up 5) and Barbados (174th, up 5), most of whom registered two or more wins in the recent Nations League action.
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