In a move
which may lead to a new name at the bottom of the World Rankings, Gibraltar
have been admitted into UEFA and will compete in the next European
Championships in 2016. Well, they’ll be
in the qualifying round beginning in Autumn 2014 anyway.
Similar in
population terms to San Marino, they will of course struggle to make an impact,
however a glance at recent results shows a 3-0 win over the Faroe Islands two
years ago. The Faroese are a couple of
notches above the likes of San Marino, so perhaps Gibraltar will be able to
avoid becoming a basement dweller in rankings terms.
This is all
slightly premature from our point of view currently though, since it is only
UEFA that have admitted Gibraltar, not FIFA.
So there will be no world ranking unless that changes.
No other
UEFA members are outside of FIFA so perhaps it is only a matter of time,
however there are cases of other national sides being part of their
confederation but not in FIFA.
Guadeloupe and Martinique in CONCACAF spring to mind.
That remains
to be seen, but Gibraltar will now be no doubt dreaming of facing either
England or Spain in the next Euro qualifiers.
