The FA are to explore options of luring Arsenal wonderkid Chido Obi-Martin, who netted 10 goals against Liverpool Under-16s on Saturday, back to representing England.
Obi-Martin, 15, has already featured for the youth sides of both Denmark – his country of birth – and England this year. He is also eligible to represent Nigeria through his father.
The forward currently plays for Denmark, scoring last month in the Under-17 UEFA European Championship qualifiers. Though it is understood that the teenager, who was brought into first-team training sessions by Mikel Arteta earlier this month, can still switch allegiance back to this country if he wishes to.
Mail Sport understands it is a route the FA are keen on looking at, having monitored his progress since last winter. He turns 16 next week.
Obi-Martin’s stunning performance on Saturday, in the Gunners’ 14-3 victory over the Reds, has thrust the 6ft 2in player into the spotlight.
Despite his age, he played for the Gunners’ Under-21 side in October and Arteta has noticed his talents.
Denmark Under-17 coach Jasper Mikkelsen two weeks ago was optimistic about the forward’s future.
He told Danish press: ‘He is not locked to Denmark. As I have been explained the rules, you can change once when you have played current matches.
‘I’m not nervous about that because we’re not going to do anything about it.
‘I just relate to the fact that Chido and his family have agreed that he would like to play for Denmark.
‘If he chooses to do it differently at some point, it’s kind of out of our hands.’
An FA spokesman was approached for comment.
Lordy2099
303
Two European Nations fighting to own an African boy, when will this exploitation of Africa stop? They hate blacks, especially Africans but want to benefit from everything from us.
Ubong12
12
Choosing DENMARK 🇩🇰 Isn't the problem here , the promise is how is club career will continue to grow in England 🏴 after snubbing them. He might not grab all this headlines no more and can be forgotten, before we know, all we read is "Remember CHIDO the 15yrs old that score 10goals in a match and where he is now", Let his parent and a genuine trustworthy mentor nurture him well, he shouldn't think of international football for now, when finally makes a name for himself and knows rejecting England 🏴 for denmark 🇩🇰 is his decision and that's final, as far as he's then known, no one will temper with his club career, just like BALOGUN did, England always wanted balogun even when they know they've got little space for him, Am saying all this because of the effect of rejecting England so so early, All the SAKAs, ANSU FATIs, YAMALs, DOKUs, BAKAYOKOs etc they could have choose the country of their fathers but the spotlight won't comeby if they snub the country where they're trying to make name for theirselves in club football. That's it 👌🏽