The three-way international tussle for Lamine Yamal

Lamine Yamal’s peformance at the ongoing European Championships is set to boost football in Equatorial Guinea, says the country’s football federation.

The 16-year-old, who has stunned the world with his displays in Germany, plays for Spain despite having an Equatoguinean mother and a Moroccan father.

He was born in Barcelona, where he grew up and is coming through La Masia academy for the five-time European champions, with whom he recently concluded his first season of action.

“Even though Lamine is not playing for Equatorial Guinea, we hold him very close in our hearts and think he is going to do many things for Equatoguinean football,” Venancio Tomas Ndong Micha, the country’s football federation president, told BBC Sport Africa.

“We are enjoying his extraordinary performances at the Euros, on top of the great season with FC Barcelona. “He has our roots, and this shows that we are a country of good footballers,” added Ndong Micha.

Entrusted with dead-ball situations for a major European football nation despite his tender age, Yamal has shown his all-around ability with his stunning goal against France and assists in the games against Croatia, Georgia and Germany.

He is set to play the final against England on Sunday, a day after he turns 17, making him the youngest player to contest a final at either the Euros or World Cup.

Pele is the youngest to play in a World Cup Final. He was 17 years 249 days when he played in Brazil’s 5-2 triumph over Sweden in the 1958 final, when he scored twice.

Yamal’s record as the youngest goal scorer at a Euros (aged 16 years 361 days) will be very hard to beat. As will his feats at Barcelona – for whom he is the youngest player to start a league game (16 years and 38 days) – and in La Liga, where he is the youngest scorer in history (16 years and 87 days).

Equatorial Guinea is a country split into two parts, with the capital Malabo located on one of its island areas while the largest city on its African mainland section is Bata, where Yamal’s mother was born.

She eventually found her way to Spain where she was working as a waitress when she met his father, from whom she has since separated.

While his mother and grandmother live in Barcelona, the rest of Yamal’s maternal family are still in Equatorial Guinea, a country which has reached the knock-out stages at the last two Africa Cup of Nations despite its small stature.

Three years ago, Equatorial Guinea’s football federation (Feguifoot) tried to secure the winger’s services for the team currently ranked 89th by Fifa, only to discover they were far behind Spain, who play England in Sunday’s European Championship final.

“We contacted the family in 2021 but the advances with the Spanish football federation had gone very deep,” Ndong Micha explained.

“But we did try, because I am a good friend of the family by chance – particularly the grandfather – and all the family used to talk about the kid.

“Then, there were also the Moroccans who went after him… but the Spanish beat us.”

Faouzi Lekjaa, the president of Morocco’s football federation, has explained how their attempts to secure Yamal last year ended in defeat, given the teenager’s firm desire to play for Spain.

Nonetheless, both African countries remain close to Yamal’s heart – as can be seen by the presence of their respective national flags on the football boots his feet dazzle in.

“This shows that even though he is playing for Spain, he is not forgetting his Equatoguinean roots,” added Ndong Micha.