Iran moves down 15 places to 59 in FIFA ranking

TEHRAN TIMES – TEHRAN/ZURICH, Iran moved 15 places down to 59th in the latest FIFA rankings released on Wednesday.

The Persians are 59 in the world and fourth in Asia, with 532 points. Japan remains on top among the Asian teams with 840 points, followed by South Korea (686) and Australia (668).

Spain will finish the year at the summit for the fifth time in succession – an achievement which earns them the ‘Team of the Year’ title – followed by Germany, Argentina and Italy (4th, up 1).

The results of 143 internationals have been taken into account for the current edition of the FIFA World Ranking. In total in 2012, the results of 900 matches have been taken into account, more than half of which were friendlies (465, 52 per cent) and more than a quarter of which were qualifying matches for the 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil (257, 29 cent), FIFA wrote.

The next FIFA World Ranking will be published on 17 January 2013.