Quote from: Sithara007 on July 06, 2025, 02:53:00 AM

Quote from: tiCeR on July 04, 2025, 09:45:03 PM

It depends what you define as an achievable goal for them, but considering the FIFA ranking, they are right now ranked 57th between South Africa and Saudi Arabia. it is not bad for a small nation, or they are not that small with their population of 35 million, but they are considered rather small in the football business.

Whether there acceptable ranking has to do with their USSR past, I don't know, but it is true that countries from that region put a lot of emphasis on sports. I personally didn't know football is a big thing there.

The FIFA ranking is misleading sometimes I think because when you argue that Uzbekistan is enthusiastic about football and sports, China is as well, but they are only ranked 94th.

Uzbekistan has hardly played against any teams outside the AFC confederation. So the current rankings doesn't really take in to account their present form. Only when they play against the top teams in tournaments such as the FIFA World Cup, their performance and prospects can be accurately measured. But I would like to repeat one thing. Performance in international football seems to have some correlation to demography. Countries with a young population are the ones who are advancing the most now.

They didn't play against outside AFC confed treams for obvious reasons, but that coefficient does somehow try to balance out the difference in strength of all teams. I agree though that these rankings have their flaws, but scrolling through their game history reveals that they are not losing games with overwhelming results against them. The last relevant game against Australia for example, it ended 1-1 in early 2024 at the Asia Cup.

But if anything, they would only play against top teams in the group stage of a World Cup and now last month they qualified for the WC 2026 for the first time ever. I think this means something, but it has to be noted that the WC was extended I think and more teams are able to participate. I don't know if it was for their improved performance, or for the expanded field of participants that they were now able to make it.