Warriors go up 16 points after USA win; T&T climb to 83rd spot in FIFA rankings

The Trinidad and Tobago National Senior Team continue to bask in the afterglow of their shock 2-1 World Cup qualifying win over the United States, as they stormed 16 places up the FIFA rankings today.

After sliding to 99th place in September, the Soca Warriors are now in 83rd spot following their first win in seven months—a period that included six competitive matches and three friendlies.

The Dennis Lawrence-coached team were the biggest movers in CONCACAF, followed by Panama and Barbados, who climbed 11 and 10 spaces respectively. Ironically, Barbados have not played since July but presumably benefited from losses suffered by teams in their neck of the rankings.

The United States also advanced one spot to 27th in the world, despite missing out on the Russia 2018 World Cup. USA hammered Panama 4-0 on 6 October before their decisive loss to Trinidad and Tobago at the Ato Boldon Stadium in Couva.

The FIFA rankings is calculated based on a formula that considers result, importance of match (whether friendly or competitive), strength of opponent and strength of confederation. The South America confederation is ranked highest, followed closely by Europe’s while Africa, Asia, Oceania and North and Central America and the Caribbean are tied last.

Lawrence said, after last week’s win over USA, that he hopes to build on that result for the future, although the David John-Williams-led Trinidad and Tobago Football Association (TTFA) is yet to announce opponents for the next FIFA match window in November and beyond.

The Warriors were ranked 49th in the world when John-Williams replaced Raymond Tim Kee as TTFA president and were 84th by the time Lawrence was hired—after the firings of former head coach Stephen Hart and his successor Tom Saintfiet respectively. Trinidad and Tobago were ranked 78th when Hart was fired in November 2016.

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