Ghana improve one place up in the latest edition of the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking released Thursday.

The Black Stars are now placed at 23rd in the October edition of the ranking thanks to their recent strong performance in the first-leg playoff victory over Egypt in the World Cup qualifying. 

Ghana, are still ranked second-best on the African continent behind Ivory Coast with Algeria and Nigeria following in third and fourth in that order. 

Kwesi Appiah's side, who are closing in on a third-straight World Cup appearance have seen their points build-up rise to 860 from their previous 830 points.

In the overall world rankings, Spain are still number one spot as Germany climb to second with Argentina in third.

Unsurprisingly, the 69 qualifiers played since the last edition of the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking, as well as the 20 friendlies and ten preliminary matches for continental competitions, have had a significant effect on the global ladder.

In the top ten, only Spain’s position at the summit remains unchanged, while Germany have pushedArgentina out of second place. New entries into the top ten are Switzerland (7th, up 7) and England(10th, up 7), both thanks to their recent strong performances in the final group games in the World Cup qualifying. Italy, meanwhile, have paid heavily for their draw against Armenia, dropping four places to eighth.

The distribution of teams in Pot 1 for the World Cup Final Draw on 6 December is as follows: Brazil, together with Spain, Germany, Argentina, Colombia, Belgium and Switzerland are definitely in Pot 1. IfUruguay win the intercontinental play-off against Jordan, they will also go into the first pot. However, if Jordan win, the decimal points difference between the Netherlands (1135.95) and Italy (1135.61) will see the Dutch take the last place in Pot 1.

This latest FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking has also determined which teams will be seeded for the European play-off draw for Brazil 2014, which will take place at the Home of FIFA in Zurich on Monday, 21 October at 14.00 CET.

The distribution of teams in Pot 1 for the European play-off draw will be the four highest-positioned teams, which are confirmed as follows: Portugal, Greece, Croatia and Ukraine. Pot 2 will include ncludeFrance, Sweden, Romania and Iceland. 

A further 20 teams have now qualified for the World Cup in addition to hosts Brazil. They are:Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, England, Germany, Honduras, Iran, Italy, Japan, Korea Republic, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Switzerlandand USA.

The next FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking will be published after completion of World Cup qualifying on 28 November 2013.