FIFA recently announced that it will ease its regulations on switching football nationalities and Munir El Haddadi appeared to be one of the players to benefit from this. In 2014, the striker of Sevilla once played thirteen minutes in a European Championship qualifying match of Spain and was therefore able to forget an international career for Morocco. El Haddadi has now been sued for after the rule change the Lions of the Atlas, but has to postpone a debut for the time being.

El Haddadi, who was born near Madrid, is also eligible to play for Morocco due to the origins of his parents and due to a lack of perspective with the Spanish national team, he would like to play his international matches for the North African country. The attacker seemed to be able to make the switch after the FIFA rule change, but may soon find himself back at the highest sports tribunal CAS.

FIFA recently announced that players may switch football nationalities as long as they have not played more than three caps for a country, none of these matches took place in a final tournament, the last international game was played at least three years ago and the player is not after the age of 21 played for a country. However, the latter provision is now causing problems for El Haddadi, as according to FIFA he has come into action for Young Spain after his 21st birthday.

The World Football Association has added that this decision can be challenged by the Moroccan national association and El Haddadi at the CAS. These parties will find their way to the sports tribunal, as they also tried in 2018 in the run-up to the World Cup to get El Haddadi to play for Morocco without success. The attacker had already been selected by national coach Vahid Halihodzic for the friendly matches against Senegal and DR Congo on Friday and next Tuesday, but will not be allowed to take action yet.