Why Lamine Yamal Chose To Play for Spain Despite Moroccan Father and Equatorial Guinean Mother?

Lamine Yamal, 16, has weaved his magic for the 3x UEFA Euro winners Spain to the final. From completing homework to powering the Spanish victory against France with a curler, Yamal is every 16-year-old’s wish to become. Anyhow, none of this would have happened. Let alone Spain, the UEFA Euro would never have featured Yamal!

He would have plied his trade in the African Cup of Nations. Courtesy of his Moroccan roots via his father, Mounir Nasaroui, the Morocco national team previously dashed to secure his services.

Meanwhile, Equatorial Guinea’s soccer federation tried to lure Yamal to their national team via his grandfather, thanks to his Equatoguinean mother Sheila Ebana. But at the end of the day, the Spanish soccer federation won the tussle for the La Masia product!

Spain gets the upper hand for Lamine Yamal over two nations!

In 2021, Equatorial Guenia’s soccer federation tried heavily to lure Lamine Yamal, only to realize “the advances with the Spanish federation had gone very deep,” pointed by Equatoguinean Football Federation president Venancio Tomas Ndong Micha. On the flipside, Morocco’s federation gave up on its attempts to bring Yamal last year, after realizing Spain was the clear winner. The Spanish Federation won the tussle because Yamal was interested in representing Spain.

“I have always played for Spain, since the under-15s. I have always been clear, I want to play for Spain,” Lamine Yamal had said in a prior interview with the Spanish Federation.

At the center of this fascination probably lies the coastline of the Mediterranean Sea…

He kick-started his soccer journey with FC Barcelona’s youth academy- La Masia when he was seven and eventually rose the ladder to represent their senior team at 15. Given this close connection to Barca and its equation with the Spanish Federation, it is no surprise Yamal opted to play for his birth nation.

Anyhow, that doesn’t mean he cares less for his roots. Yet, Yamal proudly flaunts his ethnicity.

Yamal takes to the pitch carrying a bit of his African heritage!

What’s unique about Lamine Yamal’s Adidas F50 soccer boots? They bear the flags of his parents’ countries- Morocco and Equatorial Guinea. Yamal’s boots have the flags of Morocco and Equatorial Guinea adjacently emblazoned above the Adidas F50 logo.

“This shows that even though he is playing for Spain, he is not forgetting his Equatoguinean roots,” said Ngong Micha in a recent review, lauding Yamal’s gesture of using these custom boots.

Besides, Micha said Yamal’s Equatoguinean roots show how differently the nation plays compared to other African countries. Micha added that the Barcelona starlet’s massive popularity will prompt the Equatoguinean Government to invest more in soccer and related grassroots projects.

Creating waves at just 16 (for the umpteenth time)!!!