The mysterious ranking lists that UEFA and the International Federation of Football History and Statistics (IFFHS) regularly publish for national teams and clubs, respectively, are often the objects of sarcastic comments. Despite the compilers’ assurances that the coefficient is calculated as objectively as possible, every now and then there are surprises, for example, the placement of Mexico’s national team fourth on the list of the strongest teams or the classification of the energetic, but very mediocre, Celtic as one of the world’s top ten clubs. Soccer players don’t pay any attention to this, explaining quite reasonably that only the way you play will put the record straight. So the following IFFHS information should be treated merely as an interesting trend. Analysts have considerably upped two Ukrainian clubs: Dynamo and Dnipro. Thanks to their current progress in the national championship and two wins in the Champions League, the Szabo-led Kyivans have made a spectacular jump of nearly thirty points, and now rank 57th instead of 86th. While the Dnipropetrovsk-based club has also much improved, the statisticians claim that owing to their participation in the UEFA Cup, Kucherevsky’s disciples still leave much to be desired in the domestic arena. They have climbed from 158th to 115th place. Shakhtar, which has done an excellent job in the national championship (nine victories in a row) is still floundering in the Champions League and ranks 94th. Illichivets Mariupol and Metalurh Donetsk rank 295th (was 278th) and 310th (was 236th), respectively. There are 350 teams on the ranking list, with Manchester United on top (which also raises a few questions). The latter has outstripped Real Madrid, which put on a lackluster show at the beginning of the season, and Barcelona. London-based Arsenal is 4th, although it is leading MU by almost ten points in the home championship and is putting on a no less powerful performance in the Champions League. Roman Abramovich’s club Chelsea, which, incidentally, walked over Manchester United in the Premier League’s first round, has not made the top ten at all. Milan, not least of all owing to Andriy Shevchenko, who is in splendid form, has jumped from 11th to 6th place. Juventus is still 9th, while last year’s Champions League winner Porto ranks 10th. The remaining top ten places belong to the South American clubs Boca Juniors (Argentina, 5), River Plate (Argentina, 9), and Sao Paulo (Brazil, 7). The “magicians with the soccer ball” thus have only one representative among the top ten, which is only natural because the best Brazilians have been playing in Europe for a long time. Incidentally, Dynamo’s official Web site reports that one of them, Diogo Rincon, has renewed his contract with the Kyiv club until 2010.
