FIFA Rankings: India rise one spot to 96th in first update after 2018 World Cup

Indian football team's meteoric rise up the FIFA Rankings ladder continued after the Blue Tigers climbed one spot to rise to the 96th position in the first update of the rankings system after the FIFA World Cup, which took place in Russia, in June-July.

Sunil Chhetri and co have been on a great run of form so far on the international circuit over the last couple of years, during which, they have only lost one match, an AFC Asian Cup qualifier at Kyrgyzstan.

Incidentally, India had already booked their berth in the 2019 AFC Cup by then, and the match was rendered a dead rubber for the Blue Tigers, who ended as the toppers in the group.

India, who were placed 97th in the previous FIFA Rankings update in June, seem to have gained from the newly-introduced Elo Ranking system, which follows the process of adding and subtracting points on the basis of match results, rather than taking the average of the points from a match.

Earlier this year, the Blue Tigers put out a great performance in the Intercontinental Cup, an invitational tournament, where top teams like Chinese Taipei, Kenya and New Zealand also took part.

Captain Sunil Chhetri was the star of the show at the tournament, as he took his tally to 64 goals from 101 international caps, which back then, made him the second highest active international goalscorer, behind Cristiano Ronaldo.

However, Lionel Messi has since overtaken Chhetri on that count, moving up to 65 goals from 128 internationals.

Well poised for Asian Cup knockouts?

Incidentally, the latest FIFA rankings updates mean that India are now the second highest-ranked team in Group A of the 2019 AFC Asian Cup. The top two teams, along with the four best third-placed teams from the respective groups will make it to the Round of 16 stages in the Asian Cup.

The highest-ranked team in Group A are UAE (77), followed by India (96), Bahrain (113) and Thailand (122).