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It's interesting - I can't see it affecting anyone outside the minnows, precisely because you'd have to give up any thought not just of representing your national side but also, probably, ever _playing_ your national side, or a side which has resonance for you. The Cayman Islands players were derided as mercenaries when they did it, but perhaps times change.
Having said which, the Republic of Ireland in the 80s and 90s reached a degree of eminence by getting people with tenuous (but still credible - usually one Irish-born grandparent) links to the Republic - John Aldridge, Andy Townsend and Jason McAteer - to acquire dual Irish/English nationality and play for them, and became a team that got to the World Cup finals (and beat Italy). Chris Armstrong, after people stopped tipping him for the England squad even in jest, flirted with Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and I think Barbados. John Fashanu might have turned out for Nigeria, had it not been mentioned that, no, he actually _had_ played for England, believe it or not, and I think Efan Ekoku did. Owen Hargreaves is effectively Canadian but has dual citizenship, Ryan Giggs captained the England Under-15s... I think it might just get more shameless in the lower levels. And, of course, Deco became a Portuguese citizen having never been to Portugal before he joined Benfica at 19, and can compete at the highest level and potentially play Brazil in World cups...
The rules, as I understand them, are that a player has to be a birth or naturalised citizen of a country, and must either have been born there or have lived there for two years (like John Wilkinson) - often you have to live somewhere for three years to become a citizen, so this is already accomplished. This ruling was put in place after Qatar, which is where we came in, made citizens of three Brazilian players who lived and played in Germany and had no connection to Qatar, in order to whack them into the team, essentially as a financial transaction - the national team's version of Qatar's status as the new Japan/USA for over-the-hill European legends.
Britain's a bit different, because you can't have English, Welsh, Scottish or Northern Irish citizenship. So, to avoid any Brit being able to choose a home nation at will, creating in effect a straight league of ability (England, then Scotland, then Wales, then NI), it is decided by where you were born and where your parents and grandparents were born - I could play for England or Wales but not Scotland or NI. If you are a citizen, but you, your parents and your grandparents were all born outside the country, you can take your pick - which was where Chris Armstrong came in, as he was a citizen but had not been born in Britain, and nor had any of his parents or grandparents, so he could have played for any home nation. |
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