MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine Azkals reached its highest FIFA ranking ever in the most recent ratings released by the world football governing body on Thursday, May 5.
The Azkals moved up a spot to 115 to set a new best spot for the highest-ranked side in South East Asia. The rise is 20 spots above where the Philippines was in March of this year, 135. The Azkals’ strong showing in the 2018 World Cup Qualifying matches, where they defeated Yemen and Bahrain, plus earned a win and a draw against 2010 World CupNorth Korea, which had participated in the 2010 World Cup, earned coach Thomas Dooley a two-year extension at the Azkals’ helm.
{source}<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/FIFARanking?src=hash">#FIFARanking</a><br>No change in top 10, new high for <a href="https://twitter.com/PHI_Azkals">@PHI_Azkals</a> <br>1⃣<br>2⃣<br>3⃣<br>4⃣<br>5⃣<a href="https://t.co/npskvhPWFB">https://t.co/npskvhPWFB</a> <a href="https://t.co/Za8qBaFTHn">pic.twitter.com/Za8qBaFTHn</a></p>— FIFA.com (@FIFAcom) <a href="https://twitter.com/FIFAcom/status/728132527836143616">May 5, 2016</a></blockquote>
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The Azkals will next target the AFF Suzuki Cup, which they are co-hosting with Myanmar in November and December.
Argentina remained the top squad in the world, with Belgium, Chile, Colombia and Germany rounding out the top 5. Spain, Brazil, Portugal, Uruguay and England follow to round out the next 5. – Rappler.com