USMNT falls five spots in latest FIFA rankings

The November FIFA rankings were not kind to the United States. The Americans fell five spots in the latest rankings, leaving them at No. 28.

It was always going to be tough for the U.S. to keep their former place at No. 23 after losses to Colombia and Ireland. It weakened their resume and set them up for a tumble, just like draws against Ecuador and Honduras did last month.

Making matters tougher on the U.S. is that they are just playing friendlies, while European teams are playing Euro 2016 qualifiers. Qualifiers are weighted more heavily than friendlies so not only are the Americans losing, but other teams are getting more credit for their results than the U.S. is getting for their friendlies.

The U.S. is still third in CONCACAF, behind No. 16 Costa Rica and No. 20 Mexico.

FIFA rankings are crazy, but any rankings system is going be very flawed. The good news is that the only time FIFA rankings matter is for seeding in tournaments, and the U.S. is going to be ranked high enough to be seeded in CONCACAF events. Low rankings will rule them out from being seeded at the 2018 World Cup, but that was always going to be a long shot anyway.