Turkey have climbed five places up the World Rugby Men’s Rankings powered Capgemini to 88th after beating Serbia for the first time in five attempts in Pančevo on Saturday.
Having lost all four previous matches by an average of 20 points Turkey defied history and home advantage to Serbia to come out on top, 31-22.
What made the result even more remarkable was that it was Turkey’s first win in 11 tests, a run that had dated back to October 2019.
The historic win in a match between the bottom two sides in Pool C was worth 1.96 points. With their improved rating of 31.96, Turkey have overtaken Pakistan, Mauritius, Burkina Faso, Uzbekistan and Andorra.
Serbia on the other hand have seen a dramatic fall in their rankings position – by nine places to 83rd, which is still some way off their all-time low of 91st.
No other changes in the rankings arose from the outcomes of any of the other matches in Rugby Europe competitions this weekend, the pick of which was Switzerland’s Rugby Europe Trophy title-clinching win against Ukraine.
Switzerland completed an unbeaten season in Zurich by scoring 68 unanswered points, with both wingers Cyril Fluckiger and Hugo Malyon scoring hat-tricks.
There were two more matches in the Conference in addition to Turkey’s game against Serbia, with Denmark extending their winning run against Norway to nine consecutive matches after a 41-5 victory in Copenhagen, while Austria came away from Slovenia with a 31-14 win in their final match of the competition.
Denmark are now top of Pool A, one point ahead of Latvia, who they play in a title decider on Saturday, while Austria have given themselves a chance of finishing as runners-up to champions Luxembourg.
In the Rugby Europe Development League, Montenegro overturned their defeat to Kosovo in December with a 35-12 win.
Photo credit: Turkey Rugby Federation