Profiling the world’s top sporting nations: Switzerland, Sweden, S. Korea

As a starting point, we look at the quadrennial Global Cup rankings, first analysed in this article published last December. Quadrennial periods (which we will call for brevity ‘quads’) provide a panoramic view of the world of sport, since many major international tournaments, the Olympic Games above all, are held every four years.

 

The table below shows the aggregate top-20 Global Cup ranking for the 2016-19 quad, the latest for which we have four-year data. In this article, we analyse the sporting profiles of Switzerland, Sweden and South Korea.

Switzerland gained one position in the Global Cup table for the 2016-19 quad over the previous quad. It finished 15^th in the 2019 Global Cup, and is currently fourth in the 2020 Global Cup (and second in the Per Capita Cup). In other words, Switzerland is a country very much on the up sportswise, having scored points in 20-plus sports in each of the quad’s years, and having set a new country best by scoring points in 33 sports in 2019.

 

Winter sports always play a major part in Switzerland’s performance – Alpine Skiing was the country’s top-scoring sport in 2019, 2018 and 2017, and the third in 2016 – but last year the hardy Swiss excelled also at Tennis (finishing fourth in the yearly table), Mountain Bike (second in the yearly table) and across a range of sports as diverse as Floorball, Track Cycling, Beach Volleyball and Artistic Gymnastics, to name but a few.

 

Relative to its population of 8,448,000, Switzerland is one of the world’s most successful sporting countries, having always finished in the top-10 in the Per Capita Cup across the quad’s four years, clinching third place in 2018.

Sweden was 16^th in the Global Cup table for the 2016-19 quad, the same position it held in 2011-15. Like Switzerland pre-2019, it is a country that scores points in 20-odd sports each year on a regular basis, 2016 being the year out of the quad’s four in which it scored in the most sports, 26.

 

Thanks chiefly to the Swedish ladies’ prowess at Football (they were third in the 2019 World Cup), the latter sport was the country’s highest-scoring one in 2019, 2018 and 2016. Ice Hockey contributed the most points in 2017, when Sweden was the runner-up to Canada in the annual table.

Unsurprisingly, Sweden is strong in Snow & Ice sports, especially Cross-Country Skiing (its second-best sport in 2019 and 2018) and finished in the top-10 in the sport group’s ranking in the last three years, its best finish being sixth in 2018.

 

Finally, relative to population, Sweden is one of the world’s most successful sporting countries, having always finished in the top eight in the Per Capita Cup across the quad’s four years.

Sweden finished 14^th in the 2019 Global Cup, and is currently 13^th in the 2020 Global Cup.

 

South Korea slumped significantly in the 2016-19 quad compared to the previous one, losing four positions to finish in 15^th. Compared to the countries mentioned previously, it is somewhat more specialised, with Archery, Taekwondo, Golf and ShortTrack always among South Korea’s top-five sports except for 2017 – when the country’s top sport was Shooting.

South Korea won the Archery ranking in all of the quad’s four years, scoring almost always nearly double the points of the runners-up, except in 2019. South Korea is equally dominant in Taekwondo, in which it won the Global Cup in the last three editions, and in Short Track, again with three wins in the last three years (and a third place in 2016).

 

In Golf, South Korea has had to bow to the USA in all of the quad’s four years, but nevertheless it was always on the podium (second in 2017 and 2019), chiefly thanks to its ladies, who won the Golf gender ranking in 2019.

South Korea finished 16^th in the 2019 Global Cup, and is currently 29^th in the 2020 Global Cup.

 

* position change vs previous quad

 

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Greatest Sporting Nation is a ranking of countries based on their performance in top-level international tournaments in sports in which there is genuine global competition. Countries (national teams and/or individual athletes) score Qualifying Points by finishing in the top eight places in Qualifying Events.

These Qualifying Points are then weighted to produce GSN Points, based on a formula that takes into account individual vs team sports, the sport’s participation (number of countries) and the frequency (annual/biennial/quadrennial) of the tournaments.

The Country scoring the most Points in a calendar year wins the Global Cup for that year. The country that scores the most points relative to its population wins the Per Capita Cup. For a more detailed explanation, please refer to the ‘How It Works’ section on the site.