The International Football Federations Thread

[Lineker]

Five-time World Cup winners Brazil have fallen to 19th in the Fifa world rankings, their lowest ever position.

Brazil are hosting the 2014 World Cup but a lack of competitive matches has seen them drop to their worst placing since the rankings began in 1993.

England are seventh, the Republic of Ireland are 39th, Wales move up 22 places to 49th, while Scotland are 77th and Northern Ireland are 119th.

Spain remain top of the rankings, ahead of Germany, Argentina and Croatia.

Brazil, who won the World Cup in 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994 and 2002, were ranked as the best team in the world as recently as May 2010, but are now below Greece (13th), Switzerland (15th) and Belgium (16th).

England's 1-1 draw in Montenegro has seen them fall from fourth last month to seventh, with Portugal (fifth), Colombia (sixth), Italy (eighth), the Netherlands (ninth) and Ecuador (10th) making up the rest of the top 10.

Chris Coleman's Wales side have returned to the top 50 for the first time since September 2012, but Scotland, who are already unable to qualify for the 2014 World Cup after a 2-0 defeat in Serbia, have fallen to their lowest position since August 2005.

Northern Ireland have slumped to 119th, down from 98th last month, having lost 2-0 at home against Israel.

That result puts Michael O'Neill's team below Antigua and Barbuda, Surinam and Tajikistan in the rankings

[Lineker]

Sepp Blatter's twitter has been hacked!

[King Ellis]

Sepp Ballter's twitter has been hacked!

How unfortunate for him. I hope Sepp Blatter's account is secure.

[Lineker]

Up yours Ellis.

[Lineker]

Gibraltar given full UEFA membership. Watch them qualify for France 2016 now!

They will be kept apart from Spain in qualifying groups though, for political reasons.

[Matt]

Add to Andorra, San Marino et al in the list of pointless games.

[Adam]

I'm happy for them. I hate this attitude that because a small nation is small and bad at football that they shouldn't be allowed to play. Football is for everybody.

A Scottish friend of mine said they should chuck out all the tiny nations like San Marino, Faroe Islands and Luxembourg. When I pointed out to him that the Faroe Isles have drawn with Scotland before and perhaps this means we should also chuck Scotland out he shut up.

[METALMAN]

Wow, you really put us in our place.

[METALMAN]

They should still be made to qualify earlier. Those matches bore me, and the small teams will get to win more.

[Matt]

Yeah I'm not saying don't let them play, I'm just not sure what good it does for Faroe Islands to get thrashed 4-0 by Ukraine. What the solution is, I'm not really sure since they'll gain even less by playing each other all the time. Maybe they could play against smaller nations elsewhere in the world.

[hugobomb]

There should be a tournament just before the World Cup or the Euros for all the sides that finished last in their groups.

We can warm up for Brazil vs Spain by watching Venezuela Vs San Marino

[King Ellis]

For those who are bored of the Lichtenstein and San Marino challenges on Football Manager, it's the Gibraltar challenge!

[Adam]

That doesn't seem fair to me though, and it's equally pointless. Why go through pre-qualifying when you know you will get thrashed in the next round? They'll just not bother entering, because the incentive of getting to play against world powers in brilliant stadiums won't even be there if they lose a two-legged tie to Liechtenstein.

I like it how it is now, for better or worse.

[Lineker]

Fifa president Sepp Blatter risked further criticism for comments made while congratulating the new female members of the executive committee. Lydia Nsekera became the first woman to be handed a full four-year mandate on the powerful Ex-Co but during his closing remarks, Blatter appealed for a round of applause for the three female candidates. He said: "Are there ladies in the room? Say something! You are always speaking at home, now you can speak here."

Dicknozzle.

[MDK]

He does have a point tho.

[Colly]

Bit harsh though, they were probably quiet because they were making him a sandwich in a different room.

[stokeriño]

Homosexuality is illegal in the Gulf state [Qatar], due to host the 2022 World Cup.

Fifa has passed tough new sanctions to clamp down on racism and all forms of discrimination within the game.

But asked about gay fans and players hoping to attend in 2022, Blatter said: "What you are speaking about, I do not think it is part of racism, perhaps this is going into ethics and morals."

He continued: "This, I think, is not the time being to bring it now. If you bring it to my attention then I should have a look on that.

"But I cannot give you a definite answer."

Possible conclusions to draw from this logic:

1) Combating racism has nothing to do with ethics or morals.

2) Ethics and morals [even those that could result in the harassment and/or imprisonment of football fans] are irrelevant.

Good to know, FIFA.

[Colly]

I read it more as 'homosexuality is immoral, whereas you can't help being a blacky black black, so we won't be looking into it at this time'. I may be being harsh, but I'm not totally sure I'm wrong.

[stokeriño]

That would be treading down the "is homosexuality a choice that you can change and/or be 'treated' for" path...which never ends well.

[Colly]

I'm sure he'd muddle through as always, like the Boris Johnson that we're not forced to like.