The IBSA Goalball European B Championships were held in October so they are the only tournament to influence the rankings directly.  There have still been a couple of changes to highlight

The only change in the top ten teams for the women’s division was that Germany and Israel have swapped places for ninth and tenth respectively.  The current top ten teams are Brazil, China, Turkey, USA, Japan, Russia, Canada, Australia, Germany and Israel.

Further down the list Great Britain only moved up one place to 11th after winning the tournament in Portugal.  In contrast, Spain jumped from 18th to 12th.  Iran drop six places to 21 after not playing a tournament in the last twelve months.  Portugal is a new entry to the women’s division debuting at 37.

Ukraine were the big winners in the men’s division after winning the Euro Bs with a jump from 11th to 7th in the rankings.  The current top ten teams here are Brazil, Lithuania, Iran, China, Turkey, USA, Ukraine, Sweden, Finland and Slovenia.

In other major movement, Saudi Arabia drop from 24 to 32.  Iraq also drop eight places from 33 to 41 whilst Jordan go from 42 to 48.  All these teams fell as the last tournament they played in was in October 2015. For Iraq and Jordan it was the Asia Para Games and for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia it was the Gulf Confederation Cup.  Romania also drop from 54 to 61 for the same reason.

Whilst we were in Rio and again in Sydney we received feedback regarding the world rankings although there were very few suggestions as to what might make the ranking system more reliable.  We need to find a consensus as to what criteria we can use to calculate the points received by teams.

At the moment we use the following criteria to calculate points per game

·      ·       Result of game (win, draw, loss)

·      ·       Importance of game (tournament and round robin v finals)

·      ·       Ranking of the opposing team

·      ·       Regional Ranking, (how regions compete against other regions)

·      ·       Age of the game (4 x 12 month cycles)

We can continue to use some or all of these criteria but we can also consider other criteria.

·       Number of tournaments played in a calendar year

·       Number of goals scored and conceded in the game

We would like to hear some of your suggestions.  Please note that some ideas put to us in the past do not allow for a fluid movement on a monthly basis.  The current system is one that both IBSA and the IPC are keen to continue so we will continue with the current system.  This still allows for subtle changes to be made without compromising the integrity of the current system.