After suffering defeats to Armenia and Italy in the first two matches in Group 2 of the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, Malta dropped fourteen places in the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking and is now 153rd.

Among the other European countries, Malta is ranked 49th. Lying just ahead of Malta are Luxembourg (142, down 36), Moldova (144, down 4) and Kazakhstan (147, down 5). Liechtenstein (150, down 6), Faroe Islands (158, down 4), Andorra (201, down 2) and San Marino (207, down 1) lie behind Malta.

Malta will be in action once again next week, facing the Czech Republic away from home in another World Cup qualifier.

Meanwhile leaders Spain and Germany now find themselves closely pursued by Portugal (3rd, up 1) and Argentina (4th, up 3), who both managed to secure wins in their recent preliminaries.

Colombia (9th, up 13) have moved back into the top ten for the first time since July 2002, thanks to their two impressive victories over Chile (3-1) and South American champions Uruguay (4-0).

Similarly, 2004 European champions Greece (10th, up 1) find themselves back among the world’s best teams after an absence of exactly one year, courtesy of opening wins in European Zone Group G over Lithuania (110th, up 6) and Latvia (118th, down 24).

The teams that have slipped out of the top ten are Croatia (11th, down 2) and Denmark (18th, down 8), with both having failed to secure victory last time out.

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