Most of the national team coaches seem to ignore the ranking. It seems there's at least one coach taking another stance.
I've been contacted yesterday by a coach looking to improve his team's ranking before the preliminary draw. That came as a big surprise. Usually I'm the one writing to FAs about the ranking and offering my services. The only FAs to approach me on their own were Amplistan and two other FAs - all three through one of their officials, not through the coach.
Granted, this coach is young and computer savvy and that might be the reason. Unfortunately, the team he coaches is based in a type of country I've vowed not to assist (see question 8) so I had to pass.
However, I do hope this is a sign of things to come and more coaches will start paying attention to the ranking.
I'm not saying the ranking should override all other priorities. There are certain intervals when the ranking is important as it will affect the seeding - that's when you should do your best to improve the ranking.
Using my StatCounter tracker I noticed the "Looking to improve your FIFA ranking before the draw? Use the e-mail address from my profile to contact me." thing is really starting to work as that's the link he used to reach me. :)
The links in Section 8 were not surprising for the vast majority of the countries but a couple did surprise me. Very interesting websites. As an aside I would be hopeful that if JK were the US coach during the 2006 cycle he would've at least reached out as that was the only cycle where we could've gotten a seed. Team in other confederations (or Caribbean teams) though could benefit from scheduling changes as they have other tournaments which it could be helpful to get into better pots.
ReplyDeleteNever been in touch with JK. He's not very fond of the FIFA ranking.
DeleteWhether you care about the U.S. passing Mexico in the rankings is another matter. When I asked U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann the other day, the look on his face was of someone who just encountered a very bad smell. He shook his head and didn't say a single word.
Source: SI.com