Humans are much more likely to travel the world and eventually have children with people from different places, so it’s natural that a lot of players are faced with a dilemma at international level once they start to break through.
It’s such a huge call to make at a young age because it can’t really be changed at a later date once they get some competitive senior caps, so they need to weigh up their own sense of national identity against a decision that could boost their career too.
There’s plenty of exposure to be had when it comes to playing international football, but you also don’t want to commit to a lower performing country now if you genuinely harbour ambitions of playing for a different one.
Team Talk have reported that emerging Arsenal youngster Folarin Balogun has the chance to choose between England, Nigeria and the USA, but it’s the US who are making the biggest push to bring him on board just now.
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He was actually born in New York but moved to England when he was only two years old, while the Nigerian eligibility comes through his parents who were born there.
He’s already bounced between the US and England at youth level so you would think the choice would come down to those two, while there’s a much greater chance to play in the US team at this point.
It’s not clear which country he wants to commit to at this point and there’s not any real hurry from his point of view, but it will be interesting to see what he eventually decides.