New post-World Cup team rankings
⚽ How did the World Cup affect football teams’ global rankings? FIFA is out with an update to the global men’s football rankings, with notable changes including a significant jump for Morocco’s team to the 11th spot globally, from 22 before the Qatar World Cup. Morocco is now the top-ranked African football team. Brazil maintained its spot at the top of the ranking by a small margin over world champion Argentina, which moved up one spot to #2 globally. France also rose one spot to #3. Belgium, meanwhile, fell back to #4 on the back of an early exit from the World Cup. Italy retreated to the eighth spot, opening up the door for the Netherlands to rank #6 and Croatia to rank #7. Egypt’s ranking at 39 remains unchanged.
Back to our regularly scheduled programming with the Carabao Cup: Manchester City take on Liverpool at 10pm, competing for the final spot in the quarterfinal. Seven teams have already qualified for the quarterfinals: Southampton, Wolverhampton, Newcastle, Leicester City, Nottingham Forest, Charlton Athletic and Manchester United. The quarterfinals are scheduled to begin on 9 January.
Over in the Egyptian League this weekend: On Friday, we have Al Ittihad v Ceramica Cleopatra (5pm) and El Dakhleya v Pyramids (7pm). Saturday has a busy lineup, including Aswan v Enppi (2:45pm), Haras El Hodood v National Bank (5pm), Ghazl El Mahalla v Pharco (5pm), and Future v Talaea El Gaish (7pm).