China dropped from No.72 to No.74 on the latest FIFA World Rankings for April. Though China still ranked No. 8 among Asian teams, their lead is only eight points more than No. 9 seed Iraq, far from the number needed to guarantee a seeded spot at the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers in July.

This was the second time FIFA's released the world ranking this year. Thanks to their two losses at the 2019 China Cup, to Thailand and Uzbekistan, China lost 12 points in the rankings. No.9 Iraq gained 21 points and No.7 Saudi Arabia expanded their lead to 15 points.

Since FIFA started their world rankings in August, 1993, China's average ranking has been 72, meaning that the country is doing worse than usual.

The first round of the 2022 World Cup qualifiers will happen on June 6 and 11, attended by 12 lower-ranking teams (China not included) and will decide the six teams for the next round. The six winners will join another 34 teams (including China) and learn which group they will be in or the second round. The draw will happen on July 17, based on the latest FIFA World Ranking at that time.

So far China's only confirmed game before the draw is the friendly against Bayern Munich from Bundesliga on May 29. Since they are a club instead of a national team, the result of this game should not affect China's points. Iraq already confirmed that they will play against Tunisia and Libya on June 7 and 10 respectively. If Iraq wins both games, and if China doesn't do well in the warm-ups, it's possible that Iraq can replace China as No.8 in Asia and pocket the last seeded spot in the second round of the 2022 World Cup qualifiers.