Ghana, Nigeria fall on latest FIFA Ranking

Nigeria women's team alongside Ghana dropped three and 10 places, respectively, on the last Fifa women's ranking for 2019 released by Fifa on Friday, December 13.

The failure of the West African nations to go past the third round of the Tokyo 2020 Caf Olympic Games qualifiers were accountable for their fall to the 39th and 60th spots on the latest global football rankings.

Cameroon also surprisingly dropped three spots to 49th position despite edging past giant-killers Cote d'Ivoire 2-1 to reach the final qualifying stage for the Olympic Games in November.

South Africa remained stagnant in 55th position despite losing 2-0 to Japan in a November friendly, while the Ivorians moved up six places to 63rd in the world.

Elsewhere, Kenya were one of the biggest movers following a Cecafa Women's Cup triumph, climbing up 10 spots to 133rd place, along with Uganda (seven places up) to 142nd, Tanzania (two places up) to 144th.

Overall, Nigeria are still ranked the best on the continent, with Cameroon (49th), South Africa (55th), Ghana (60th), Cote d'Ivoire (63rd), Equatorial Guinea (71st), Morocco (81st), Mali (82nd) and Algeria (84th) and Congo (101st) occupying the top 10 spots.

Globally, Brazil earned their return to the top 10 after Friday's convincing 6-0 victory over Mexico, while world champions the United States, Germany, the Netherlands, France and Sweden ended the year in the top five places of the world rankings.

Democratic Republic of Congo (108th) were rewarded with a massive 10 spots rise following a shock 2-1 home win over Cameroon in the 2020 Olympic qualifiers in October.

A total of 29 of African nations retained their spots in the last global ranking for the year following the expulsion of West African sides Senegal and Burkina Faso from the log due to prolonged inactivity.

The next edition of the women's ranking will be released on March 27, 2020 - a week before the commencement of the 2020 African Women's Cup of Nations qualifiers.