Football village witnessed another miracle thanks to... naturalization

After a series of miracles in Asia, Morocco recently once again shocked the world of top football thanks to the achievements it has achieved from naturalizing players.

Morocco won the U20 World Cup thanks to naturalized key players

On the morning of October 20 (Vietnam time), Morocco with its naturalized stars excellently defeated Argentina 2-0 in the final match of the 2025 U20 World Cup, thereby winning the world championship for youth players for the first time in history.

Although youth football is known to be a place that often holds big surprises, the fact that an African representative won the World Cup still really surprised the football world.

This is only the second time in the history of the 24 U20 World Cup tournaments that a football team from the black continent has won (the first time was Ghana in 2009).

And it's no surprise that nearly half of Morocco's squad for the U20 World Cup comes from... the white continent. At least nine of coach Mohamed Ouahbi's players are naturalized, mostly from France, Belgium and the Netherlands.

The list includes Yanis Benchaouch, Ali Maamar, Ismael Baouf, Anas Tajaouart, Naim Byar, Othmane Maamma, Ilias Boumassaoudi, Ibrahim Gomis and Gessime Yassine.

Most of them played the role of pillars of the team, entered the field and shone brightly in the final match. Midfielder Maamma was also awarded the title of Best Player of the tournament.

Maamma, whose parents both emigrated to France from Morocco, grew up in Ales, a region in the south of France, and attended the training camp of the famous Montpellier club. At the age of 20, Maamma currently plays for Watford in the English First Division.

With clear bloodline origins, players from Moroccan expatriate families have no difficulty or ambiguity in naturalizing.

Morocco booms thanks to naturalization - Photo: REUTERS

Morocco is one of the football nations that has sparked the naturalization trend in recent years, when they exploded at the 2022 World Cup. At the world football festival, Morocco reached the semi-finals with half of the players born outside the country's borders.

At the youth level, naturalization is less common because teams prefer to use purely native talents. Only when reaching the real national team, coaches call up more naturalized players to increase strength.

But with its own unique circumstances, Morocco has maintained close contact with overseas players for many years.

Many stars like Maamma choose to play for Morocco instead of the powerful European national teams, even though they could. At the 2022 World Cup, this has been considered a source of pride for Moroccan football, because their naturalized stars like Hakimi are even ranked among the best in the world.

HUY DANG

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/lang-bong-da-lai-chung-kien-sieu-ky-tich-nho-nhap-tich-2025102009162691.htm