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Valencia leaps onto list

Rangers earn spot on CNN/World Soccer Top 10

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Posted: Monday August 16, 1999 06:03 PM

CNN/World Soccer Top 10 Rankings for the week of Aug. 16-22. Rk. Team Country Pts. 1 (1) 2 (2) 3 (2) 4 (5) 5 (9) 6 (--) 7 (--) 8 (4) 9 (6) 10 (7) Manchester United Bayern Munich Palmeiras AC Milan Boca Juniors Valencia Rangers Barcelona Lazio Real Madrid England Germany Brazil Italy Argentina Spain Scotland Spain Italy Spain 103 68 59 52 50 43 25 23 21 19 Last week's rank in parentheses. React Give us your opinion of the CNN/World Soccer Top 10, and check back next Monday to read the best of the responses. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your hometown: Enter your reaction: Reactions An objective "top 10" would include only European clubs, which is where all of the world's top players, many of them South American, perform. -- G. Baptista, Washington, D.C. U.S. Glad to see that you included three clubs from South America. Keep track of clubs all over the world and not just Europe. Great start! -- Robert Wierenga, New Port Richey, Florida, U.S. Arsenal are just as good, if not better, than Manchester United. Manchester just got lucky last year. This year Arsenal will win. They should at least be top 5 in your poll. -- Jans Fiedler, Lens, France For more Reactions... Instant Poll Which country has the strongest league in the Americas? Argentina Brazil Chile Colombia Mexico U.S. View Results

ATLANTA (CNN/SI) -- The day after capturing the first piece of silverware in the new Spanish season, Valencia leaps to the sixth spot on the second edition of the CNN/World Soccer Top 10.

Scotland's Rangers is the other club to jump onto the unique list of club football teams, which is issued each Monday and is determined through voting by correspondents from CNN Sports and World Soccer magazine.

Falling off the list for this week were Corinthians of Brazil and Parma of Italy, which fell at Rangers midweek in a Champions League qualifying match.

Topping the list for the second straight week is English club Manchester United, which won its spot after winning last season's historic treble of the English Premiership title, FA Cup and European Champions League. Man United kept the top spot this week with 4-0 and 2-0 wins over Sheffield Wednesday and Leeds United, respectively.

Man United will face a stern test August 22, squaring off against Arsenal, which again came up short of the CNN/World Soccer Top 10. The match could be one of Man United's toughest leading up to FIFA's world club championship in Brazil in January.

Bundesliga champion Bayern Munich started its title defense with a 2-2 draw but still managed to push away from Palmeiras of Brazil for sole ownership of second.

With the Italian season still nearly two weeks away, the defending Serie A champion -- talent-laden AC Milan -- holds fourth place. Boca Juniors, having dominated Argentina's domestic league for the last two seasons, moves up to fifth.

Fourth-place finisher in last year's Spanish Primera, Valencia jumps to sixth in the Top 10 after winning the Spanish Super Cup on aggregate over defending champion Barcelona. Rangers follows in seventh after its dominating performance in the Scottish Premier League and its midweek win over Parma.

As the Spanish league prepares to kick off August 22, defending champ Barcelona falls from fourth to eighth after losing the Spanish Super Cup. Italy's Lazio falls three spots from sixth to ninth, while Spain's Real Madrid rounds out the Top 10.

Read your responses to last week's poll, and tell us what you think of the second edition.

 

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