Euro 2024: FIFA Rankings

EC ranking 2024 – Team by team

Which team is the highest ranked at Euro 2024? This is how the FIFA rankings currently look along side the current odds from bet365.

France highest ranked in Euro 2024

World Cup runners-up France are the highest ranked team in Euro 2024. Les Blues are second in the FIFA world ranking list, behind Argentina and thus first in Europe. Their run to the the World Cup Final brought France up to second overall and first in Europe in the FIFA rankings. The last time France were number one in the world was in September 2018. Since then, their position has fluctuated between place two and four. Their performance in the World Cup saw them jump from fourth place up to second, making them Europe’s top ranked team.

England and Belgium ranked second and third in Europe

England are the second highest ranked team in Europe, behind the French in third place overall. Third is the highest place England have occupied in the FIFA World Rankings since they were introduced in 1992. Europe’s third ranked team are Belgium who are fourth in the world rankings. The Belgian men’s national team were the best in the world from 2018 to 2022, according to FIFA, but since February 10, 2022, they have fluctuated between second and fifth place in the FIFA world rankings. Should Belgium reach the final in Germany they would probably break into the top three again.

Albania lowest ranked in Euro 2024

Albania , playing in only their second ever major tournament, are the lowest-ranked team in the Euro 2024 according to FIFA’s world rankings. At the time of writing, the “Eagles” are in 64th place in the world, which is 9 places lower than Slovenia, who are the second lowest ranked. If Israel, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iceland, Luxembourg, Georgia or Kazakhstan qualify for the European Championship Finals via the playoffs then Albania will no longer be the worst ranked. Of the playoff teams, Kazakhstan are in the lowest position in FIFA’s world ranking list, in 100th place.

Visit our EC guide

At Betting.com you will find all the information you need before the start of Euro 2024. Check out all participating teams’ squads, schedule and odds.

EC Ranking vs Odds

If you look at the odds from bet365 on each nation winning the tournament alongside the rankings there are some parallels and some discrepencies. England and France are both ranked in the World’s top three and are the two nations who the bookies have down as favourites.

However, Belgium have much higher odds than their ranking suggests. Germany, on the other hand have shorter odds. This is partly down to the Germans having home advantage and a number of people believing that they are about to come good again after a difficult period.

 Another team that stands out a little negatively in terms of winning odds are Croatia. Confidence in the World Cup third placers is quite low and even though they ranked eighth place in Europe, their odds are longer than that position would suggest, possibly down to a belief that they are an aging team.

Further down the odds list, not entirely unexpectedly, are the worst-ranked teams. Slovakia, priced at 500/1 have the highest odds of the teams who have qualified automatically.

About the FIFA ranking

The FIFA ranking is a ranking system used to rank national football teams around the world. It is updated monthly by the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and is based on the results of international matches. The rankings are used to determine seeding in tournaments such as the FIFA World Cup and the Euros and to give an indication of each national team’s performance compared to other countries. The higher a country’s position in the rankings, the better its team is considered to be.

Points system

Points are calculated based on a number of factors, including match results, opponent rankings and the type of competition involved. Winning teams receive more points than teams who draw or lose, and points may also be affected by whether the match was played at home or away. Some tournaments and matches have a higher weight in the calculation of points than others, such as European Championship qualifiers and European Championship play-off matches. Finally, the points from each match are added and subtracted to calculate the total number of points for a national team.

The FIFA world ranking system uses a formula to calculate the points for each international match. The formula takes into account several factors, including confederation, match status, match results and the opponent’s world ranking points.

1. Confederation: If both countries are from the same confederation, for example UEFA, the confederation factor is assigned 0.99. If countries from different confederations meet, the average of their confederation values ​​is calculated. This gives an indication of the difference in opponent strength based on their origin. For example, Germany and an Asian or African country get a confederation factor of about 0.92.
2. Match Status: Practice matches always have a status value of 1.0. Qualifiers and finals have higher status values, with a World Cup final giving the highest value of 4.0. The higher the status of the match, the higher status value is assigned.
3. Match result: The result of the match affects the distribution of points. A win gives 3 points, a cross gives 1 point, and a loss gives no points.
4. Current Ranking and Opponent’s Strength Points: The fixed value of 200 is subtracted with the opponent’s current ranking position. This gives an indication of the opponent’s strength and affects the point distribution in a match.

In summary, by multiplying the confederation factor, the match status value, the match result and the opponent’s strength score, you get a sum that represents the score of an international according to the FIFA world ranking system.