KARACHI: Pakistan’s free fall in the FIFA rankings continued when the national team plummeted to an all-time low of 197th on Thursday.

The new rankings list, unveiled on Thursday, represents a fall of three places from last month for Pakistan. Pakistan were ranked 194th from July to September.

They are also Asia’s second-lowest team in the rankings, only ahead of 202-placed Mongolia.

The game in the country has suffered over the last year with the Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) having split into two factions following a bitter dispute ahead of the presidential election in June last year.

The Lahore High Court (LHC) has since ruled that Faisal Saleh Hayat, the man who is recognised as PFF president by world’s football governing body FIFA, is no longer the country’s football chief and ordered fresh elections.

The national team’s last match was a 2018 World Cup qualifier against Yemen in March last year.

The Hayat faction has since pulled Pakistan out of the SAFF Suzuki Cup, late last year, and the upcoming AFC Solidarity Cup.

The FIFA ranking is calculated by taking into account the team’s results in competitive and friendly matches over a four-year period.

Published in Dawn, October 21st, 2016