Former Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy has reignited France’s long-running argument over immigration and national identity after writing that the country’s World Cup team was playing “without Frenchmen”, days before it meets Spain in the semi-final.
Rajoy, who led a People’s Party (PP) government between 2011 and 2018, made the remark in a football column for the Spanish newspaper El Debate published on July 10.
Writing after Spain’s 2-1 quarter-final win over Belgium, he looked ahead to the last-four tie against Didier Deschamps’ side, due to be played on July 14.
He acknowledged that France had been world champions twice and had won every match at the tournament, describing the squad as top-class. “But without Frenchmen,” he added.
Only three of the 26 players called up by Deschamps were born abroad: Michael Olise, born in London; Marcus Thuram, born in Parma, northern Italy; and Brice Samba, born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Much of the rest of the squad, though, is made up of the children or grandchildren of immigrants, the question at the heart of a dispute that has recurred in France for decades.
The remark drew a swift response across the French political spectrum. Interior minister Laurent Nuñez said it was “absolutely unacceptable” if accurately reported, while the French Football Federation accused Rajoy of intolerable racist undertones and said its players needed no lesson in nationality from a former Spanish premier.
In Spain, Pedro Sánchez’s Socialist government led the criticism.
Sánchez said belonging to a country was not measured by surname or skin colour, in a pointed rebuke of his predecessor.
Foreign minister José Manuel Albares called the comment “hurtful and dangerous”, and transport minister Óscar Puente resorted to personal insults against the former leader.
Rajoy, who has filed a column after each Spain match at the tournament, said he did not wish to cause trouble and did not withdraw the remark.
The reaction echoed the backlash that followed France’s 1998 World Cup triumph, when the makeup of the winning side was similarly questioned and the country’s right accused of denying the team its due.
