Skip to Content News Archives Economy Energy Oil & Gas Renewables Electric Vehicles Mining Commodities Agriculture Real Estate Mortgages Mortgage Rates Finance Banking Insurance Fintech Cryptocurrency Work Wealth Smart Money Wealth Management Investor Personal Finance Family Finance Retirement Taxes High Net Worth FP Comment Executive Women Puzzmo Newsletters Financial Times Business Essentials More Innovation Information Technology FP500 Podcasts Small Business Lives Told Tails Told Shopping Financial Post Store Obituaries Place a Notice Advertising Advertising With Us Advertising Solutions Postmedia Ad Manager Sponsorship Requests Classifieds Place a Classifieds ad Working Profile Settings My Subscriptions Saved Articles My Offers Newsletters Customer Service FAQ News Economy Energy Mining Real Estate Finance Work Wealth Investor FP Comment Executive Women Puzzmo Newsletters Financial Times Business Essentials HomeFP CommentWilliam Watson: A beautiful neoliberal gameNo market is more global than that for soccer players and teams and yet the World Cup shows how much we all still love our countriesLast updated 7 minutes ago You can save this article by registering for free here. Or sign-in if you have an account.The ethnic and racial mix of teams is a tribute to the past half-century of liberal immigration policies in many formerly very monochromatic places. Photo by Fran Santiago/Getty ImagesDonald Trump got lots of grief for leaning on FIFA President Gianni Infantino to overturn the red-card suspension of star United States soccer player Folarin Balogun even as he himself was trying to red-card “birthright citizenship,” which is how Balogun, who spent only the first two months of his life in the U.S., got his citizenship after airlines wouldn’t let his very pregnant mother board a return flight to England at the end of a U.S. visit in 2001.Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.Exclusive articles from Barbara Shecter, Joe O'Connor, Gabriel Friedman, and others.Daily content from Financial Times, the world's leading global business publication.Unlimited online access to read articles from Financial Post, National Post and 15 news sites across Canada with one account.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles, including the New York Times Crossword.Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.Exclusive articles from Barbara Shecter, Joe O'Connor, Gabriel Friedman and others.Daily content from Financial Times, the world's leading global business publication.Unlimited online access to read articles from Financial Post, National Post and 15 news sites across Canada with one account.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles, including the New York Times Crossword.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one account.Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.Enjoy additional articles per month.Get email updates from your favourite authors.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one accountShare your thoughts and join the conversation in the commentsEnjoy additional articles per monthGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountorHypocrisy, thy name is politics, so a little double-think in the national team’s interest is hardly shocking. Besides, in principle there’s nothing wrong with living by the birthright citizenship rules even as you try to change them — even if, in practice, Trump is hardly a stickler for living by rules.Get the latest headlines, breaking news and columns.By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.The next issue of Top Stories will soon be in your inbox.We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try againWar is said to be “long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror.” Many of us have always found soccer/football to be similar: lots of passing the ball back and forth — there are literally hundreds of passes per game — occasionally interrupted by something thrilling. Often the thrill/boredom ratio is painfully low. In this World Cup it does seem to have been generally higher.For proud neoliberals such as myself, there has been the added enjoyment that the whole thing is a celebration of globalism and a demonstration, as some of us have always argued, that liberal internationalism isn’t really in conflict with nationalism.The national teams themselves are a tribute to liberal immigration policies. The red-carded American Balogun could have played for England or Nigeria in addition to the U.S. He did play for England in under-17 competition. His current professional team is Monaco, where, for tax reasons, many stars and ex-stars presumably have residence.In their professional careers, players don’t necessarily go to the highest bidder. But they do play in a world market. Canada’s Alphonso Davies is employed by Bayern Munich, Jonathan David by Juventus in Turin. Players naturally want to play for the best teams. Fans naturally want their teams to get the best players, wherever they’re from. Football is now a very competitive global market — though it wasn’t until liberalizations in the 1970s in the U.K. and the 1990s in Europe allowed non-nationals to move much more easily.In this World Cup, according to Reuters, only nine countries fielded players born only at home (including Brazil and Spain). Curaçao had 25 players born outside that tiny island. Cape Verde, which made an astonishing run, taking Argentina to extra time in the round of 32, had 14, maybe the most famous being Roberto “Pico” Lopes, who was born in Ireland and plays for the Shamrock Rovers. Ireland itself not having qualified for the World Cup, many Irish fans transferred their loyalty to Cape/Cabo Verde.Canada had seven players not born here, the U.S. six.The ethnic and racial mix of teams is also a tribute to the past half-century of liberal immigration policies in many formerly very monochromatic places. Identity categories are always tricky, even dangerous, but, judging by the official World Cup rosters, Germany’s 2026 team had at least 10 non-white players. Germany! Hitler’s wizened soul must be writhing in whatever cesspool in Hell it inhabits.More than half of our “Canadian heroes,” as coach Jesse Marsch rightly called them after they beat South Africa to advance to the round of 16, are non-white. Though that’s much higher than in the population at large, the population at large had no trouble getting behind them, exulting in their successes and sharing in their worst moments — i.e., the devastating injury to mid-fielder Ismael Köné (born in the Ivory Coast, plays professionally in Italy).Fan support for the different national teams was also impressive. That Scotland’s Tartan Army could come to the United States and drink dry first Boston and then Miami is a tribute to their love of country, even in a globalized world, but also the ease of travel thanks to gradual deregulation of the international market for air travel. Given the high price of FIFA tickets, it’s also a tribute to the general rise of incomes worldwide over the past few decades as a result of the liberal internationalism now so widely decried.Visitors aside, many of those who showed up to root for all the different countries in plazas and watch parties across North America are immigrants from those countries, either recent or distant. (When not rooting for Canada I pull for Scotland, home of my forbears.) Most of us can sympathize with the young man who told CBC before the Canada-Morocco game that he was torn between these two countries he loves, the country of his birth, Morocco, and now his new country, Canada.The world is more open, people work in distant places, travel and migration are easier than ever, many of us change nationalities and yet it is clear from watching World Cup fans that none of that reduces people’s love for their countries. Join the Conversation This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.