Despite not qualifying for the just con­cluded 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Canada, Ghana’s Black Queens maintained their place in the latest global rankings released by the world governing body.

However, the Black Queens dropped one place in the African rankings allowing the impressive Cameroonians to take over the second place on the continent.

In Africa, the Super Falcons got a total of 1633 points in the month of March till date and remained the best in Africa while the Indomi­table Lioness of Camer­oon overtook Ghana in second spot rising up 10 places to 43.

The Black Queens of Ghana are third best African team unmoved in 52nd and Equatorial Guinea remain fourth in number 55 while South Africa moved a place up to 59 in fifth spot and Cote d’Ivoire remain 67th in the World.

Gabon made the high­est surge moving up 20 places to 118th spot, while Lesotho suffered the heaviest crash drop­ping 11 spots to 142nd in Africa.

Fresh from their triumph at the FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015, the USA have reclaimed pole position in the FIFA/ Coca-Cola Women’s World Ranking, relegat­ing Germany to second place by some distance.

The two heavyweights in women’s football went toe to toe in the semi-finals in Montreal, with the Americans prevailing to secure the top slot.

Quarter-finalists France retain a narrow advantage in third place over Japan, despite the latter making it all the way to the final.

The leading pack now has a new challenger in the shape of England, who have attained their high­est-ever position after reaching the semi-finals and defeating Germany in the match for third place.

Elsewhere in the top ten, Sweden have lost further ground by slip­ping to seventh, while World Cup hosts Canada have dropped out of the top ten altogether after just two wins in five games against lesser-ranked teams, falling three places to 11th.

In addition to England, three teams are now in their highest-ever posi­tion: Colombia (25th, up 3), Costa Rica (34th, up 3) and Cameroon (43rd, up ten).

Cameroon beat two higher-ranked teams in Ecuador and Switzer­land and only lost by one goal to Japan and China PR respectively.

Six teams (Indonesia, Congo, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan, Gabon and Kenya) have re-entered the ranking af­ter long periods of inac­tivity, which means that 141 teams are currently ranked – the highest total since December 2007.

The next Fifa ranking for women will be pub­lished on 19 December 2015.