April 11 – Barcelona forward Munir El Haddadi has appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in his bid to switch national allegiance from Spain to Morocco ahead of the World Cup.
El Haddadi, who is on loan at Alaves from Barcelona, is challenging FIFA rules which stop players swapping countries and CAS said in a statement that he had appealed jointly with the Moroccan Football Federation after FIFA turned down his request on March 13.
FIFA rules bar players from switching allegiance once they have played a competitive international even if they hold dual nationality.
El Haddadi, who was born in Madrid and has a Moroccan father, made a single appearance for Spain in a European Championship qualifier against Macedonia in September 2014, when he came on as a substitute and played less than 15 minutes.
“The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has registered an appeal filed jointly by the football player Munir El Haddadi and the Moroccan Football Federation against the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and the Spanish Football Federation,” a CAS statement said.
“Munir El Haddadi and the Moroccan Football Federation are challenging the decision issued on 13 March 2018 by the FIFA Players’ Status Committee in which their request to have the sporting nationality of Munir El Haddadi changed from Spain to Morocco was rejected.”
CAS said it has been asked to make a decision by mid-May “in order for the player’s sporting nationality to be decided prior to the commencement of the 2018 World Cup”. Spain and Morocco have been drawn in the same group alongside Portugal and Iran.
A panel of three arbitrators will now be selected to hear the case. “Following the hearing, the panel will deliberate and issue a decision in the form of an arbitral award,” the body said.
Interestingly the FIFA stakeholders committee is studying a proposal to make the rules more flexible especially in cases where a player has perhaps made one or two appearances for his original country but has little or no chance of a recall.
“It’s a good time to have a look at this and see if there are solutions, without hurting the integrity of the game,” the committee’s chairman and Concacaf boss Victor Montagliani said back in October.
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