There has been few changes in the world rankings one month after the FIFA World Cup following Spain's victory on July 11.

The European champions won the world title for the first time and shot to the top of the rankings as number one in the latest rankings released on Wednesday in Zurich.

Nigeria's Super Eagles, ousted in the first round at the June 10 to July 11 World Cup in South Africa, slumped to 30th last month.

They are still ranked in the same position in the latest release. Egypt is still Africa's top ranked team, maintaining the ninth position they occupied in last month's rankings.

Ghana's brilliant showing at the Mundial which shot them to the 23rd in the world is the second in Africa behind the Egyptians.

While the Egyptians amassed a total of 1,053 points, Ghana's Black Stars have 874 points.

Cote d'Ivoire's Elephants with 843 points are the world's number 26, remain Africa's third ranked side.

Nigeria has 773 points and remains fourth position in Africa. Algeria, Gabon, Cameroon and Burkina Faso are the other African teams rated among the world's top 50 teams.

Algeria and Gabon are ranked 33rd and 34th respectively and Cameroon's Indomitable Lions, who lost all three group games at the World Cup to Japan, Denmark and the Netherlands, plummeted to the 40th position.

They are still 40th in the August rankings released on Wednesday.

At the top, there has been no change with the World Cup runners-up Netherlands still the world's second team and five-time winners, Brazil in third place.

Germany, Argentina, World Cup semifinalists, Uruguay are fourth, fifth and sixth respectively.

England, Portugal, Egypt and Chile occupy the seventh, eigthth, ninth and 10th positions respectively.

Four-time World Cup winners Italy, ousted in the opening round of the championship in South Africa, slumped to 11th position.

However, the biggest casualty of the latest ranking are the United States. They lost five places from their 13th position last month to 18th in Wednesday's release.

The Americans' four wins at last year's CONCACAF Gold Cup have dropped in value according to the criteria for ranking.

FIFA said three amendments have been made to the confederations criteria for determining the world rankings.

They are based on results at the last three FIFA World Cups. The world soccer body said following the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, matches over the next four years involving teams from South America, North, Central America and the Caribbean and Africa will receive a slightly higher weighting.

It said the weightings are Europe 1.00, South America 1.00 (+0.02), North, Central America and the Caribbean 0.88 (+0.02), Africa 0.86 (+0.01), Asia and Oceania (both 0.85).