Europe fuels the scoring engine at Nations Cup

Half of the 8 goals scored so far at the AFCON came from European-born players, highlighting the growing dependency of the region's national teams on footballers from the diaspora

Half of the eight goals scored so far at the African Nations Cup came from European-born players, highlighting the growing dependency of the region's national teams on footballers from the diaspora. Only two of the 16 countries at the finals drew their 23-man squads exclusively from home-born players.
South Africa's captain Dean Furman was raised in London and has never played for a South African club.
However, like many others, he has been snapped up to play for the national team because of his profile as an ex-Chelsea apprentice and his ready-made potential for international duty.
The majority of African countries now actively pursue emerging talent among the immigrant communities in Europe, believing the players have had much better coaching and offer more in terms of discipline and tactical acumen.
Algeria and Equatorial Guinea have 15 European-born players each at this year's tournament, focusing their selection policy on the best talent they can find among immigrant offspring in France and Spain respectively and filling the gap with locals.
Saturday's Nations Cup opening day saw goals by Spanish-born Emilio Nsue for Equatorial Guinea and an equaliser from Congo's Thievy Bifouma, born within sight of the Stade de France. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, born in France, brought up in Italy and now playing in Germany, scored for Gabon in their 2-0 win over Congo in the second game of the tournament.
Yannick Bolaise, who was born in Lyon, found the net for the Democratic Republic of Congo in Sunday's draw with Zambia.
Allegiance
The profile of most of the players is similar.
They are the offspring of either one or two parents from Africa, born in countries like Britain, France, Portugal, the Netherlands and Spain, and playing at a high domestic level.
Many have played at junior level for the land of their birth but have not made the full national team and have changed their allegiance to the countries from where they descend.
FIFA's statutes were changed in 2003 to allow a player who had represented one country at junior level to choose to play for another country, as long as he was eligible for dual nationality and had not played a full A international. This was all at the behest of Algeria, who felt a dip in performance in the 1990s could be solved by strengthening their squad with players of Algerian descent from France's junior teams.
They are now Africa's top-ranked team and their best performer at last year's World Cup, where they reached the second round for the first time, was former France under-21 international Yacine Brahimi. It is unlikely that teams such as Equatorial Guinea and the Cape Verde Islands could be competitive at the Nations Cup without their foreign-born players.
However, moves by countries like Nigeria, which has a population well above 100 million, to set up scouting structures in Britain and the U.S. to find immigrant talent undermines their internal structures and reduces the chances of African-born children reaching the highest levels of the game.
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