The Football Ferns have dropped four places in the official FIFA women’s world rankings, to an all-time low of 30th.

Since 2003, the New Zealand women’s national team have dropped from 21st place.

Over the past 20 years, the team has achieved an average ranking of 22.

After their two-match series in Colombia in the November international window — a 0-0 draw and a 1-0 loss — the Ferns have slipped from 26th to 30th.

New Zealand trail Czechia (#28) and Poland (#29) but remain ahead of Argentina (#31) and Wales (#32).

The highest ranking achieved by the Ferns was in 2015.

New Zealand are the highest-ranked team in Oceania, ahead of Papua New Guinea (#56), Fiji (#72), Tonga (#94), Samoa (#95), New Caledonia (#106), Solomon Islands (#109), Tahiti (#112), Cook Islands (#113), Vanuatu (#117) and America Samoa (#147).

Australia are 12th in the latest ratings, after slipping two places since the FIFA Women’s World Cup.

Reigning world champions Spain (1st) claimed top spot for the first time. They are the fourth team in football history to reach the coveted position, after the United States (2nd, up 1), Germany and Sweden and France (3rd, up 2).

England (4th) remain just below the three highflyers, ahead of previous leaders Sweden (5th, down 4). Germany (6th), the Netherlands (7th), Japan (8th), Korea DPR (9th) and Canada (10th).

Brazil (11th, down 2) dropped out of the top 10.

More than 400 international matches were played during the latest assessment period, and the rankings now include a record 192 countries.

How the rankings are calculated

Points are allocated to teams from their most recent games and are weighted using the following criteria:

• Result of the match.
• Home vs away, or neutral ground.
• Importance of the match.
• Difference in ranking between the teams.

Beating a highly-rated team, away, and in a tournament, rather than a friendly, can boost a team’s momentum up the rankings.

A win over a lowly-rated team can have little impact.

Winning or losing of course is the most important criteria, but goal difference and goals scored are also taken into account as is shown in the following table.

READ MORE: The methodology used to rank teams >>>>>

How the Ferns have ranked

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