The composition of teams in the World Cup suggests that modern national identity cannot be easily disentangled from colonialism, empire and migration.

The World Cup always brings to the fore what is sometimes seen as a pure and mostly straightforward form of identity: national identity. This 2026 tournament has demonstrated, perhaps as clearly as any global event can, that modern national identity is complex, contested and far from straightforward.

The composition of the Moroccan World Cup squad offers a useful case in point. Nineteen of the 26 players on the squad were born outside Morocco, many of them either in Spain or France, the two European powers that colonised the country. The composition of the team has raised fascinating questions about dual citizenship and loyalty, national identity, the diaspora and the enduring legacies of colonialism.

Similar complexities are visible across the tournament. Many of the players on the national teams of the United States, Canada, France, England, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Australia come from immigrant families.

In an era of increasingly exclusionary nationalist politics in North America and Europe, some of the countries engaged in the most intense debates about national identity are being represented on the world’s biggest sporting stage by multicultural teams.

The historical........

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