Opta’s African teams rankings: Rivers United are the best NPFL club, Enyimba 62nd in Africa

Nigerian teams have been poor on the continent in recent years, and they have fallen off some of their counterparts in other parts of Africa

Former Nigeria Professional Football League champions Rivers United have been ranked as the best Nigerian club on the continent by Opta, Soccernet reports.

Nigerian clubs have failed to exert their dominance on the continent in recent years. The last time a Nigerian club reached the final of a CAF competition was in 2009 when Heartland lost to Congolese side TP Mazembe in the CAF Champions League.

Since then, they have consistently fumbled in CAF's competitions. In fact, no Nigerian club is in the CAF Champions League this season.

Also, on the home scene, they have not exactly inspired much confidence with the structure and running of the clubs.

Statistics and analytics experts Opta have released the rankings for confederations across the world, and no Nigerian club is in the top 29 in Africa.

According to Opta, the clubs were ranked by the “Elo algorithm”, which is used to analyse match results from over 2,500,000 games since 1990 to assign a rating to each team that is comparable across leagues, countries, and continents.

In Africa, the best team is South African giants Mamelodi Sundowns. They are closely followed by Al Ahly, Wydad Casablanca, FAR Rabat, Raja Casablanca, Pyramids, FUS Rabat, Orlando Pirates, Simba FC, and Young Africans.

Rivers United, the highest-ranked Nigerian team, are 30th, Enyimba are the second-best team from Nigeria, and they sit 62nd. Akwa United, the third-best Nigerian club, are 82nd in Africa, Plateau are fourth in Nigeria and 101 in Africa, while Bendel Insurance 199th are the fifth-best Nigerian club.