Gridiron Nations Championship launches Tackle World Ranking

MoV + time-decay Elo model uses IFAF competitions and international friendlies dating back to 1999

VANCOUVER — The Gridiron Nations Championship (GNC) today released the GNC Tackle World Ranking, a results-based international ranking system designed to provide a transparent, continuously updatable view of senior men’s tackle national team performance.

The ranking model incorporates international results from IFAF competitions and international friendlies dating back to 1999 and is updated after each scored match. The system is intended as a practical alternative, given that IFAF’s published world ranking has seen limited adjustment over time. Unlike the GNC Tackle World Ranking, IFAF’s ranking methodology does not include international friendlies or exhibition games in its calculation.

Current Top Eight Active Teams

Definition: “Active” = at least one scored international game in the last six seasons (based on the dataset through Dec. 13, 2025) and 5+ scored games overall. Germany was active in the last GNC, but has inactivated their Men's National Team as of 10 January, 2026.

1. Top eight “active” teams (played since 2020, 5+ scored games)

2. Teams that have paused or declared their programs inactive ([2] USA, [10] SWE, [11] FRA, [14] SUI) have been extracted from the rating.

1	Austria	Tier 1 - Active	1627.797
2	Canada	Tier 1 - Active	1546.318
3	Japan	Tier 1 - Active	1535.407
4	Mexico	Tier 1 - Active	1523.72
5	Australia	Tier 1 - Active	1510.575
6	Finland	Tier 1 - Active	1510.366
7	Italy	Tier 1 - Active	1502.87
8	Germany	Tier 1 - Inactive	1462.506

How it works

The GNC Tackle World Ranking uses an Elo framework adapted for international football:

• Elo base: teams gain/lose rating points after every match based on expected result vs actual result

• Margin of Victory (MoV): larger wins count more than narrow wins (with safeguards to avoid runaway blowout inflation)

• Time decay: recent games matter more than older games (a half-life approach), ensuring rankings reflect the current era while still respecting long-term results

This is a results-only rating, not a poll, and is not influenced by subjective committee inputs.

Program activity notes

The GNC ranking tracks results on the field, but also recognizes that national programs can pause or become inactive due to external circumstances:

• France and Switzerland have paused senior tackle national team activity in recent periods; their historical results remain included in the long-span dataset.

• Belarus and Russia have been inactive in international competition in connection with the ongoing war in Ukraine and its broader sporting consequences.

About the GNC Annual Tackle World Ranking

The GNC Annual Tackle World Ranking is published by the Gridiron Nations Championship as a standardized rating system for senior men’s tackle national teams, using international results from 1999 to present across IFAF competitions and international friendlies included in the underlying match list.