With 99 players born in France but just 23 playing for Les Bleus, the tournament highlights how lines of nationality are blurred
It’s a “Love Letter to England”. Written by James Graham, the man whose play Dear England transformed the image of Gareth Southgate from a mediocre national manager into an icon of Englishness, the 90-second film, designed to rouse support for the team at the World Cup, is tub-thumping in a restrained, very Southgate way.
Narrated by Ian McKellen at his most sonorous, it concludes: “We know who we are”. Yet, if this World Cup has shown us anything, it is how complicated it can be to define “who we are”.
Michael Olise, one of the world’s best forwards, was born in west London and played for Reading and Crystal Palace before joining the German giants Bayern Munich, but may win the World Cup with France. Born to a British-Nigerian father and Franco-Algerian mother, he celebrates the fact that he is the product of “four countries… which all enrich me”.
When England took on DR Congo last week, facing them was Aaron Wan-Bissaka, born in Croydon and currently playing for West Ham.
Continue @ The Observer.
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