Football

FIFA’s proposed Nationality Rule: Nigeria might have to compensate England for Iwobi

Published

9 years ago

October 25, 2017

By Boluwatife Ezekiel Olaleye

FIFA is currently considering several options in their bid to effect changes to the rules guiding players nationality switch after representing another country at junior level.

Head of FIFA stakeholders committee Victor Montagliani confirmed they are looking into the rule, which currently forbids players who have played a competitive international for one team from switching to another national side even when they hold dual nationality.

Already the Cape Verde football federation has proposed for the rule to be relaxed especially when the player has only featured in few games, say one or two games for his original side, but has no chance of earning a recall.

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However, FIFA only allows players to represent a country with no blood relation if they have played and lived there for five years, a rule which Montagliani said could be reviewed into changing the period probably extending it.

The other option the Montagliani lead committee are looking at is a compensation scheme in cases where a player goes through the training system of one country and represent it at youth level before switching to another.