In many cases players had played in other countries football teams. They had different birth places and nationalities. The reasons for this vary in all players. In the past, rules were different. There were a few players who played with different nationality and FIFA didn’t make any objection on them. Alfredo di Stefano was one of them. In 1945, he participated in the game from Argentina team but in 1957 he was a part of Spanish football team. FIFA later allowed any player who have citizenship/nationality of the representing country, can play from that country. This was implemented in 2004.
Deco, a Brazilian by birth but he got Portuguese citizenship after spending six years in the country. He played against Brazil and performed well. Chelsea’s Diego another player, played for two teams in 2013-14. He was a Brazilian player but also has Spanish nationality. The football federation of Spain requested for the permission to allow Diego. So, he left his Brazilian team and represented Spanish team in 2014.
Lukas Podolski is in the same category. He was born in Poland but as his grandparents had German nationality he lived there. For some reasons family moved back to Poland. The polish football coach did not accept him for his game and he was restricted to the club level. Lukas talent attracted Germans so they took him in their team. Lukas first time played for Germany in 2004.
War is another reason in some cases. NevenSubotic born in Yugoslavia, migrated to Germany because of war. Later moved to USA and he played from USA for U-17 and U-20 teams. He wanted to play from Serbia but was rejected. Pepe a Portuguese player belongs to Brazil in reality. He has won 2016 Euro cup with the Portugal team. Thiago Motta also Brazil birth joined Italian squad.
Some other popular player’s names are mentioned above.
Borussia Dortmund
Jonathan de Guzman
Kevin-Prince Boateng
Aiden McGeady
Marcos Senna
MiroslavKlose
Marko Marin
Cacau