The Moroccan neighbor

Good friends, like-minded, attract. Bad neighbors, incompatible polarities, repel. Morocco is down there and right here, 14 kilometers of salt water that separate two countries, two continents, and two worlds. As it is repeated with resignation and accepted with fatalism, "Spain and Morocco are condemned to understand each other." Not "destined." Nor "obliged." No. They are "condemned." Spain and Morocco do not share a destiny. Nor do they have a common duty. They suffer a mutual condemnation.

Franco and Mohammed V , Juan Carlos I and Hassan II were "condemned to understand each other." And today, Felipe VI and Mohammed Idem. But they don't understand each other beyond the conventional, hollow diplomatic declarations between "friends" and neighbors. We don't understand each other beyond pragmatic commercial relations. And although the balance of payments and other socioeconomic indices and indicators of human development don't favor us, Morocco continues to bother and blackmail us. Aside from the Saharan dust it sends us every now and then to brighten our lives and remind us of the Green March, Morocco is Perejil, El Tarajal Beach and the Ceuta Fence, all of Melilla, the sovereignty plazas, the Canary Islands, the small boats, the fishing grounds and quotas, the Pegasus affair...

...And football. While he's working to incite and instigate the relevant events and with the right people, he's already building a colossal stadium in Casablanca, named Hassan II, with a capacity for 115,000 spectators, with the intention of hosting the 2030 World Cup final, instead of the Santiago Bernabéu, in the capital of the most important and important host country.

Meanwhile, the club continues to strive to attract eligible players to its ranks, who must choose between being Spanish or Moroccan. Some, like Lamine , stayed here. Others, like Hakimi and Brahim , went there, hoping to face less competition when it came to making their mark internationally. Now, the dilemma arises with two promising Castilla players, included in Spain and Morocco's preliminary squads for the U-20 World Cup, to be held in Chile between September 27 and October 19: Rachad Fettal and Thiago Pitarch .

If a footballer who could be Spanish chooses to be Moroccan, it's only a setback for Spain. For Morocco, it's a propaganda success. A political victory. In other sports, it's different. For example, our athletics is full of young men and women, of Moroccan birth or origin, and of all age categories. Some are or have been absolute national record holders who didn't, don't, and won't consider swapping the north of the Strait for the south.

The best known are Mohamed Attaoui, Ayad Lamdassem, Adel Mechaal, Majida Maayouf , etc. We include the sanctioned Mo Katir, Hamid Ben Daoud, Abdelaziz Merzougui , and Ilias Fifa . Their sins don't change the fact of adoption. Footballers, or so it seems, are driven by self-interest rather than patriotism. Athletes, by survival.

For soccer players, Morocco is a job offer. For athletes, Spain is a life choice.