Agree to a point. The last really GREAT Brazil team was back (WC 1982) in the days of Socrates and Leonardo.
The rankings have been updated. The top 10: 1. Spain 2. Germany 3. Argentina 4. Croatia 5. Netherlands 6. Portugal 7. Colombia 8. Italy 9. England 10. Ecuador And Brazil have dropped down to 22nd... http://www.fifa.com/worldranking/rankingtable/index.html
Croatia 4th? And they got dumped out in the group stage of the last Euros & didn't make it to South Africa. Colombia 7th? Mind boggles.
Looking at the Asian qualifying group, it's looking increasingly likely that the qualifiers will be Japan (obviously), South Korea and, mind blowingly, Oman and Uzbekistan. The latter only have to beat South Korea to qualify, but will go through if Iran lose to Lebanon. That's got to be one of the shocks of the year?
http://fourfourtwo.com/blogs/fourfo.../14/how-the-fifa-rankings-are-worked-out.aspx Explains howrankings are worked out