A wind of revolt within the Atlas Lions?

Many dual-national players are considering renouncing to defend the colors of Morocco and joining the national team of their country of birth or their second parents. Several of them playing in the Netherlands and Belgium would be determined to go back on their choice to play for Morocco, due to the marginalization they believe they are experiencing from Walid Regragui who is slow to call them up.

The Belgian football federation is closely following the situation of right-back Zakaria El Ouahdi and will try to convince him to join the Red Devils to the detriment of the Atlas Lions, said Domenico Tedesco, the coach of the Belgian team, stressing that the player of Moroccan origin has not yet played an official match with the Moroccan team.

For his part, the Dutch Olympic team (U21) has called up the offensive winger Couhaib Driouech, already a Moroccan international for having won the Africa Cup of Nations with the U23 of Morocco, as well as the young left-back Anass Salah-Eddine who, he, is still awaiting a call-up to the Moroccan selection.

Morocco has deployed an aggressive sports diplomacy in recent years to convince several dual-national talents to join the den of the Atlas Lions. The latest is Osame Sahraoui, playing at Lille, who chose to play for Morocco to the detriment of Norway. The FRMF is also trying to snatch the Lille prodigy, Ayyoub Bouaddi, a member of the French under-20 team.

According to FIFA regulations, a dual-national can change sports nationality if he is 21 years old or younger and has not played more than three matches with the first national team.