More and more over the past ten years players who have two nationalities swap allegiancesto gain an International career or more so, have a potentially more successful one. In nations like America, France and even England players who have citizenship in that country decided against playing for a nation which may have been where they were born to play for somewhere which has a chance of playing in larger tournaments or even gain more International awards. The three players above in the image are all examples of Dual Nationals, Julian Green on the left played for all of the German junior teams but decided to play for his place of birth and recently gained his first cap for the US in a "friendly" against Mexico. Diego Costa is Brazilian born and raised but has played in Spain long enough to earn himself Spanish citizenship as well as a call up to Del Bosque's squad due to his lack of competitive caps for Brazil. Raheem Sterling should have been a Reggae Boy as they are affectionately known in Jamaica, being born in Kingston made Jamaicans feel he was their new upcoming star, until he snubbed the place of his birth for a England call up instead. Is this a fair rule? or does the ability to play for two nations due to some line of heritage ruin the chances of nations building up their young talent?
Firstly If I cover the positive sides to the policy and then I'll explain the negatives it allows you to look at it and decided whether or no the policy is for your liking. The main advantage of Dual Nationals is for smaller nations in the soccer world are able to gain some foreign talent that may not be good enough for their own home side but are definitely good enough for their new adopted home. The way it generally works for youth set ups in national teams is that the FA's create grass roots systems and therefore the better the system, in theory, the better the players they create but in some nations they cannot afford to create and develop these talents or even to implement a system itself therefore have to rely on foreigners gaining citizenship and playing for their national side or that their young talents go and develop abroad and the FA then have fingers crossed that they don't lose that talent to the national team where they went to develop. For instance this sort of situation has happened in the example of Eduardo and Croatia. Eduardo supposedly had no hope in hell in breaking into the Brazilian national team due to him playing for Dinamo Zagreb and other Croatian teams. Eventually he played there for long enough and earned the ability to declare Croatian Citizenship, jumping at the chance he took up the offer and was called up to national team, becoming quite a stalwart in the call ups for National side. The same situation had also happened within the USA on multiple occasions for their national team.
Another advantage would be relating to a players career, if they have the opportunity to make it onto the international stage with their adopted home for the team they are playing with, it can further their playing career and make them a better player. What I am trying to get across is the situation that imagine a player has the eligibility to play England in this case, but has no real chance of making it into the International side, meaning that his career maybe held back from it's true potential. Then he gets a notification from his agent or that nations FA that he is now eligible to play for their side if he takes up citizenry in that nation, let's say Canada in this case. It would lead up to the situation that if he becomes a constant player in the Canadian national team and shows his class on the bigger stage, no matter who he plays for, scouts will notice this and could lead to said player moving from Montreal to a European side like Marseille perhaps. Nadir Belhadj was born in France and was playing for small teams within the French League system until he was called up to the Algeria squad, after a few appearances for the winger in the North African side, he earned himself a transfer to the recently bought out Portsmouth side with their new supposed bags of cash, he had a fairly memorable time in Portsmouth managing to convince Pompey fans he was worth the 4 million spent on him.
It's not all good however, like I stated before, some nations young stars go abroad to further their development meaning that when they gain eventual citizenship it allows them to abandon their home nation to play for a team with more chances at winning a major tournament. When the young players travel away from home to experience the academies within bigger footballing nations, or more economically well off ones, it means they spend most of their young lives abroad, and potentially gaining the ability to declare citizenship in that nation. When they get the chance to show themselves off in that league or for a team it might garner interest from that adopted nations FA, and for many young players the opportunity is too good to turn down if it is for a bigger nation, leaving that smaller side left without their rising star and still in the thick of it in terms of growth. My favourite example of this is Raheem Sterling, the youngster was born in Kingston, Jamaica. He at first declared his aim to play for the Reggae Boyz and make them a stronger side, however when he broke into the Liverpool first team he gained a lot of attention from the English FA. Eventually, due to his gained citizenship, he was offered a call up from the English national side to play against Sweden in a friendly, leaving Jamaica without what was supposed to be their next big star.
I feel personally that with the recent acquisition by Spain of Diego Costa, that the International stage is also becoming some sort of business, because it allows national teams to acquire stars as long as they have played long enough in that nations leagues. It doesn't feel right for me to see that players feel that it is simply fine to drop the nation that they are born in and might even be good enough to get into the national side, in some cases walk into the team, but because of the potential to play at a major tournament they go and abandon the team. I feel especially with nations like Spain also getting in on the act even though they have plenty of talent in their national pool shows that it is definitely becoming a situation of exploiting the rules of FIFA, for instance a few years back England were even thinking about offering Mikel Arteta a call up due to his passing ability, but that just wouldn't be right seeing the talent that England have playing for their teams in the Premier League. Also however I see the Diego Costa situation one of insanity, Costa is a world class player, he is definitely good enough to get into the Brazil squad, Scolari was even planning on making him his star at the upcoming World Cup and yet he turns his back on them to play for the World Champions, we don't know the reasoning behind Costa's defection, but according to the Brazilian footballing federation his decision was based off of the offer the Spanish put forward to him regarding financial awards for his appearances, which is an issue for multiple players.
For me, I feel I have no issue with the Nationals who change their citizenship in the case that they have no chance in playing for their home nation, that being of the case of Danny Cadamarteri for Gibraltar or Steven Beitashour for Iran. Both players have heritage for their nations and it feels right that they have the opportunity to play for them because of them having family from these nations but in the case of Diego Costa or Jerome Boateng, it feels wrong that they turn their back on their home countries for the fact that maybe they can reap more rewards for their International career and whilst I have no issues with players wanting the urge to win everything they can for their national side, but personally I feel in certain cases they are getting rid of all the hard work that should come with International call ups and is a short cut to success.
I'd love to hear your views and if you disagree, tell me why?
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