Mamelodi Sundowns and Orlando Pirates are currently ranked among the top 10 teams in Africa, according to Opta’s global team rankings.
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 men’s domestic football teams and over 2,000 women’s domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
In our last update of the Opta Power Rankings, Sundowns had actually just moved into 100th place globally and were the highest-ranked African team ahead of Al Ahly.
However, they have since dropped back into second place in Africa and currently sit in 142nd place globally, having dropped four places this current week.
Meanwhile, Pirates currently sit in sixth place among the African teams and in 237th globally. Unlike Sundowns, they climbed up six spots in the latest Opta update.
Al Ahly, Sundowns and RS Berkane are currently the three highest-ranked African team, followed by Pyramids and FAR Rabat. Young Africans, ES Tunis, MC Alger and CR Belouizdad follow Pirates to complete the top 10.
Opta Power Ranking explained:
It allows to compare teams in different countries or continents to inform decisions on a comparable scale.
The Opta Power Rankings rank teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world (currently Liverpool). The Power Rankings are updated daily and currently rank teams from 183 different countries and 413 unique domestic leagues, providing a truly global rating system in men’s football.
A teams’ rankings is determined by its results in domestic and international tournaments but also the strength of the respective competitions.
