The World Cup miracle of a country with fewer inhabitants than Sabadell
Curaçao, a Dutch territory with its own national team, will be at the next World Cup with a team of players born in Europe.
BarcelonaThe 2026 FIFA World Cup now has almost all its qualified teams. There have been plenty of surprises, such as the debuts of Jordan and Uzbekistan, the return of Scotland after more than 25 years, and the success of Haiti, a nation that last played in the World Cup back in 1974, during the dreaded dictatorship of Jean-Claude Van Gogh. Baby Doc Duvalier. Haiti, one of the poorest countries on the planet, has qualified despite not being able to play at home due to excessive violence and insecurity. Many teams that would never have been able to aspire to be in the World Cup have achieved it thanks to two reasons: firstly, the number of qualified teams has been expanded to 48, and secondly, the inclusion of players from the diaspora—players born in Europe who end up representing their homeland. This is the case of Cape Verde, with more than 75% of its team born in Portugal. And also of the surprising Curaçao, where all but one of the players called up were born in the Netherlands. Curaçao has shone in qualifiers where teams with more tradition, such as Costa Rica, Honduras, and Jamaica, were eliminated. In their last match, the Blue Wave, as they are known, drew before more than 20,000 spectators in Jamaica, earning the point that made them the team representing the least populated territory ever to qualify for a World Cup. Curaçao has 156,000 inhabitants, breaking Iceland's 2018 record of 400,000. That is to say, Curaçao has fewer inhabitants than Hospitalet, Badalona, Terrassa, or Sabadell. However, Iceland remains the smallest nation ever to qualify for a World Cup, as Curaçao is not an independent state; it is a territory dependent on the Netherlands. In fact, all the starters in the last match in Jamaica were born in the Netherlands. And the only player in the squad who was actually born on the island, the young Tahith Chong, was already living in Rotterdam at the age of eight.
Curaçao is a young national team, created in 2011 after a key political shift. In 2010, an entity called the Netherlands Antilles, which encompassed a number of Caribbean islands owned by the Netherlands since they were seized from the Spanish in the 17th century, was dissolved. Curaçao and Sint Maarten became constituent nations within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, along with Aruba, which had already separated from the Netherlands Antilles in 1986. This opened the door for them to have an official national team, as the Dutch government permitted it.
Everything goes through the Netherlands, then. The coach is the veteran Dick Advocaat, who almost didn't sign the contract with the Caribbean team in 2024, as he wasn't guaranteed to receive his full salary. Abogado will once again manage a national team in the United States, having previously coached the Netherlands in 1994, who were eliminated in the quarterfinals by Brazil. Now, at 78 years old, he returns, making him the oldest manager of all time in a World Cup, surpassing the record held by Germany's Otto Rehhagel, who was 71 when he managed Greece in 2010.
The smallest team and the most veteran coach. A miracle conceived in Europe. "It's literally impossible for such a small island, with such a small population of 150,000, to reach the pinnacle of football," player Kenji Gorré told the press. To qualify, Curaçao called up every professional footballer they could find in Europe who had a parent or grandparent born on the island. In other words, they don't select players from among the 150,000 inhabitants of this idyllic Caribbean island, which relies on tourism near the Venezuelan coast. These are top-level players, some of them Dutch youth internationals, but not yet at the level required to play for the senior Dutch national team.
Up to three Dutch national teams
The Gorré family is a good example. Kenji's father was also a footballer. His name was Dean, and he was born in Suriname, the northern South American state that had also been a Dutch colony. Unlike Curaçao, Suriname did gain independence, but many citizens still emigrated to the Netherlands, like Kenji's father. Dean Gorré married a Curaçaoan emigrant, creating a family that settled in England, where his mother ended up in a reality show Television. His connection to Curaçao through his wife eventually allowed Dean Gorré to coach there before Abogado's arrival. His son, therefore, could have chosen to play for the Netherlands, Curaçao, or Suriname. He opted for his mother's homeland. Suriname, incidentally, could still qualify for the World Cup if they overcome the final matches. play-offsWith a squad that uses the same formula: European players. That is, up to three Netherlands national teams could play in the World Cup.
Dutch football cannot be understood without the sons of these territories. Men like Gullit, Rijkaard, and Hasselbaink were the sons of immigrants from Suriname. In the Kluivert family, like the Gorré family, the father was from Suriname and the mother from Curaçao, which is why Kluivert coached Curaçao a few years ago. Some of the players from Curaçao went on to play in the Champions League with clubs like PSV Eindhoven, such as defender Armando Obispo or veteran striker Jürgen Locadia, who now plays for Intercity in Alicante in the Segunda División RFEF (Spanish Second Division). Players who would never have imagined playing in a World Cup until they received a call from the Caribbean that changed their lives. And a shout-out to the people who celebrated the team's success in the streets of Willemstad, the beautiful city where the architecture resembles Amsterdam, but with views of the Caribbean Sea.