Daily Mail said that the top World Cup player based on FIFA's official player index is a surprising entry from France. Karim Benzema has somehow managed to topple top goal scorer James Rodriguez of Colombia, Brazil's Neymar, and Lionel Messi of Argentina according to the Castrol Index, which utilizes the tracking technology employed by the world soccer body to capture data on each player.
The data reportedly retrived by the said technology is sent to a team of performance analysts who measure and assess each pass, tackle and move on the pitch to determine whether if the move has a positive or negative effect when it comes to scoring or conceding. The player are then rated from one to ten based on the evaluations.
The Castrol Index rated Benzema at an impressive 9.79, despite failing to score in his team's last three matches in the tournament. Rodriguez is trailing at a vry close second at 9.74. When comparing the two's performances at every match. Rodriguez appeared to be the more effective player as he manages to score at least once in all of Colombia's games. The 22 year-old hotshot even managed to score one for his home team during its final match against Brazil.
Neymar and Messi are beaten by France defender Raphael Varane, who scored third place with a 9.7 rating, even though he was to blame for Mats Hummels' winning header for Germany, Daily Mail said. Hummels follows closely behind Thiago Silva of Brazil at a 0.03 difference. Neymar secured the 8th spot in the Castrol Index, thanks to his impressive four goals before succumbing to a back injury during his team's match against the Colombians.
The most surprising revelation in the player index is that Messi did not make it in the top ten. Messi ranked way below David Luiz of Brazil, Holland's Stefan de Vrij and Belgiun's Jan Vertonghen with a score of 9.41. Germany's hero Thomas Muller did poorly based on the index, as he is two places further back from Messi at 9.36 despite netting the same amount of goals.
The player ranking system has continued to baffle sports pundits, despite the fact that FIFA has released a video explaining the system. On the other hand, Yahoo Sports said that the science behind the ranking system does not back the intangibles that are hard to be calculated.
