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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Sport
Faisa Mohamed and Alfie Packham

‘I root for underdogs’: football fans who don’t support their home country

India have never played at a World Cup but plenty of fans in Kolkata support Brazil.
India have never played at a World Cup but plenty of fans in Kolkata support Brazil. Photograph: Sudipta Das/NurPhoto/Shutterstock

Footballers need to be born in a country or have a family tie to that place to represent them at the World Cup, but those rules do not apply to supporters. Sometimes fans are won over by a team, a star player or even a country. Here six fans tell us why they decided not to support the country of their birth and instead root for teams with whom they have no family ties.

‘I don’t know any other France fans’

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