A Bright International Future Awaits Belgium’s Young Starlets

Young, talented, and capable of achieving great things. When you put it like that, Belgium’s new wave of footballers sound just like CatchSeventy7…

Belgium: Might set the world alight?

National identity is a hard thing to describe.

Some countries become famous around the globe for the cultural, political or social delights they bring to a wider audience. Other countries are lucky to be known for one or two things — if anything at all.

Marked on those admittedly limited criteria, Belgium undoubtedly falls into the later category. The list of things the European country is famous for is pretty short: chocolate, beer, housing European, bordering France…

Basically, the country described by Charles De Gaulle as,“an aberration of history” is rarely a first port of call for tourists visiting Europe.

In sport, the story is similar. Partly due to its size (its population is just under 11 million), Belgium has never been known as a footballing powerhouse. Qualifications for big international competitions have been limited and, on the whole, unsuccessful.

Yet, slightly under the radar, the country is slowly producing a group of young players that look talented enough to make the oft-overlooked country a sizeable player in European and international football.