A fourth place finish at the 2012 Africa Cup of Nations has helped push Ghana, three places up to 23rd on the FIFA rankings released today.

According to FIFA, the CAF Africa Cup of Nations has left its mark on the latest edition of the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking.

The Black Stars, who lost two competitive games at the 2012 Nations Cup are still Africa’s second best side behind Ivory Coast after gaining 40 points to accumulate 819.

Algeria remain third with new African champions, Zambia taking fourth on the continental ranking table.

Changes have also been seen in the top ten with all that due to the devaluation of matches from previous years, as no top-ten team has played a match in the last month.

World champions, Spain still leads the overall standing followed by Germany and the Netherlands in third position.

Results of 51 international matches were taken into account in compiling the current edition of the ranking, of which 32 took place as part of the CAF Africa Cup of Nations and 19 were friendlies.