Why a Team GB men's football team at 2028 Olympics would pose no threat to home nations' status

It was an argument that bubbled over for nearly a decade despite the fact that there only seemed to be one side to it – in the run up to the London Olympic Games in 2012, the debate over whether Great Britain should field a football team ran on and on, with opposition from fan groups and FAs primarily based on the grounds that there was a concern that it would erode the independent status of the four Home Nations. The fact that it was hard to figure out exactly who wanted to do away with England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland for good didn’t seem to factor into it.

Eventually, a tenuous compromise was reached and Team GB did indeed field a football team with a squad consisting of 13 English players and five from Wales, with the latter included in spite of the protestations of the Welsh FA. 12 years have passed since Team GB played their dreadfully dreary opening game against Senegal at Old Trafford, and the scars from the battles over its existence and make-up apparently dissuaded anyone from trying to make it happen again – until now.

The British Olympic Association (BOA) now want a British men’s team at Los Angeles 2028, with chief executive Andy Anson saying it would be “brilliant for football” and something that he would “dearly love to happen.” It’s an idea that perhaps threatens to re-open old wounds, but maybe the fact that the sky failed to cave in after 2012 will give it more of a chance this time around, especially given that the British women’s team already exists quite cheerfully.

The main concern, voiced repeatedly by the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish FAs and echoed in a joint letter penned by the official fans groups of the four nations, was that playing as Great Britain officially would risk FIFA or UEFA trying to force them to cease operating as independent football teams altogether and come together under a single British banner – but it was hard to decipher who actually wanted that outcome.

Sepp Blatter, the FIFA president from 1998 to 2015, provided written guarantees that fielding a British team at the London Olympics would not cause the various FAs to “lose the rights and privileges acquired back in 1947” – referencing the year in which the Home Nations returned to the FIFA fold following World War Two – and the only prominent official who seemed to make a statement threatening Scottish, Welsh or Irish footballing autonomy was UEFA general secretary David Taylor, who stated that it would be “difficult to see what guarantees could be given.” Taylor, however, stressed that he was speaking as a Scot and former Scottish FA president rather than in an official capacity. There was no push to end well over a century of sporting independence for the four Home Nations.

Now, with Paris 2024 in the books, those old fears may have eased. Participation in London 2012 never had any noticeable ripple effects. The Home Nations remain entirely separate entities and there still doesn’t seem to be anybody who wishes to change that – and even if somebody tried, it’s hard to imagine the scale of the uproar from the FAs and fans that such a move would evoke.

The women’s team, in any case, survived. It took a while for an agreement to be reached after 2012 and no team was entered in 2016, but by the time Tokyo 2020 came around the women’s team was back, reaching the quarter-finals as both they and the men’s team had at London. They failed to qualify for Paris (GB qualify if any of the member nations finish top of one of the four Group As in the Women’s Nations League and England came second) but the team would have been there if they were able. Again, nothing has happened to push a permanent Great British or United Kingdom team on the world.

Furthermore, a Great British team played in the Olympics consistently up until 1974, when the team was dissolved after The FA ceased to recognise the distinction between professionals and amateurs – the England Amateur team had been the basis for the Olympic side. Britain even won gold in 1900, 1908 and 1912, although these successes took place in the Wild West days of the Olympics when medals were handed out for town planning and the horse high jump. Those questionable golds aside, at no point in 74 years of British Olympic football does there seem to have been a tangible threat to merge Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland with the English team on a full-time basis.

All of which leaves the question – exactly what is the argument against entering a team? Qualification would (pending FIFA’s approval) presumably work in the same way as it does for the women. The qualifying tournament for the men is the European Under-21 Championship, and if any member nation did well enough then Great Britain would qualify as a whole. It is impossible to imagine who would use this as an excuse to attack the independence of the FAs, or why they would do so. It has always been an ephemeral and illusory threat.

The women are already involved quite cheerfully, and while there would be hand-wringing over the extra games (in a packed year, the LA Games will start just days after the final of Euro 2028) but it’s unlikely that Team GB would call up any players involved in the Euros, especially given that only three players over the age of 23 can be included in the squads. Clubs would likely retain the right to refuse to release players if deemed necessary.

So why not start Team GB back up? Well, perhaps because the quality of football played by a team completely unfamiliar with each other at London 2012 was distinctly sub-par. That 1-1 draw with Senegal was a woeful attempt at a football match, with a crowd engaging in relentless Mexican waves to alleviate the tedium – but one failure hardly begets others, and at least the kit looked fantastic.

Perhaps because there’s an argument that football shouldn’t be in the Olympics at all, a case inevitably made by plenty of fans whenever the Games come around, but it remains firmly on the programme and is a big draw which sells plenty of tickets – and although it may not be considered a critical event to fans of men’s football in Europe, it carries a lot of weight in South America, in particular, and in the women’s game. The fact is that the arguments against forming a team for 2028, much like they were in 2012, are rather weak.

So why not let Anson and the BOA have their dream? Who would be harmed? Plenty of fans would be indifferent, and that’s a perfectly reasonable stance to take, but many would be thrilled to watch the budding stars of British football take to global sports’ grandest stage alongside whoever 2028’s version of Ryan Giggs turns out to be (ideally in a strictly sporting sense). And maybe it would even be worth a medal or two down the line… You never know. Ultimately, the cost to fielding a team in Los Angeles looks minimal, at worst.