Update the rank in a MySQL Table

Question

I have the following table structure for a table Player

Table Player {  
Long playerID;  
Long points;  
Long rank;  
}

Assuming that th

Answer 1

EDIT: The update statement presented earlier did not work.

Although this is not exactly what you are asking for: You can generate the rank on the fly when selecting:

select p1.playerID, p1.points, (1 + (
    select count(playerID) 
      from Player p2 
     where p2.points > p1.points
    )) as rank
from Player p1
order by points desc

---

EDIT: Trying the UPDATE statement once more. How about a temporary table:

create temporary table PlayerRank
    as select p1.playerID, (1 + (select count(playerID) 
                                   from Player p2 
                                  where p2.points > p1.points
              )) as rank
         from Player p1;

update Player p set rank = (select rank from PlayerRank r 
                             where r.playerID = p.playerID);

drop table PlayerRank;

Hope this helps.