Breaking a barrier: Djed Spence, England’s first Muslim footballer

By MNTV Staff Writer

When Djed Spence came off the bench in Belgrade on 9 September 2025, replacing Reece James in the 69th minute of England’s 5-0 World Cup qualifying win over Serbia, he did something no man had done in the long history of the England men’s team. 

He became its first Muslim international.

That it took until 2025 for that barrier to fall says a great deal — about representation, about pathways, about who has and has not seen themselves in an England shirt. 

That it was Spence who broke it, a full-back who took the road less travelled to get there, makes the story all the richer. 

Now, at the 2026 World Cup, he carries that history onto the game’s biggest stage.

“I was surprised, really — first ever”

Spence himself did not know. When told he was in line to become England’s first openly Muslim player, his reaction was disbelief as much as pride. “It’s a blessing, it’s amazing,” he said. 

“I was surprised, really, first ever. I don’t have the words.” 

The English Football Association does not record players’ religions, but Spence is understood to be the first Muslim man to represent the senior side — a milestone confirmed by outlets from ESPN to the Muslim News.

A convert to Islam, Spence has never been shy about the place his faith holds in his life. 

“First things first, God is the greatest. I pray a lot. I give gratitude to God,” he told reporters around his call-up. In the darkest moments of his career, he said, he always believed God was by his side — and in the good moments, he made a point of giving thanks. 

His faith, he added, had helped him through the “biggest hurdle” of his footballing journey.

Road less travelled

That hurdle was real. Spence’s career has been anything but a straight line to the top. Born in London to a family of Afro-Guyanese and Jamaican descent, he came through at Middlesbrough before earning a move to Tottenham Hotspur in 2022 for a fee that could rise to £20 million — on the back of winning promotion with Nottingham Forest.

But the welcome was cold. Manager Antonio Conte publicly dismissed him as a signing the club, rather than he, had wanted — a comment Spence has said shattered his confidence. 

There followed three separate loan spells, at Rennes, Leeds United and Genoa, the wilderness years of a player struggling to find a home. Many careers quietly fade at that point. 

Spence’s did the opposite. He fought his way back into the Tottenham side, became a key figure in the team that ended the club’s 17-year trophy drought with a European final triumph, and turned himself into exactly the kind of relentless, physically combative, elastic wing-back that Thomas Tuchel came to value.

By the time England called, he had earned it the hard way. Captain Harry Kane handed him his debut cap in the dressing room in Belgrade, telling him he had watched his growth and knew how hard the climb had been.

More than footballer

The significance of Spence’s breakthrough extends well beyond the pitch. British Muslims make up around six percent of the U.K. population but have remained strikingly underrepresented in the professional game, and almost invisible at international level. Advocates have long pointed to a lack of pathways and role models. 

As Yunus Lunat, a former chair of the FA’s race equality advisory board, put it, the surprise is not that a Muslim finally played for England, but that it took until 2025.

That is why figures across the game have framed Spence as carrying a responsibility larger than himself. 

Ebadur Rahman, founder of Nujum Sports, which supports hundreds of Muslim athletes, said Spence now plays not only for England but as a role model for Muslims around the world — at a time of rising anti-Muslim hatred in Britain, where studies have found Muslim footballers subjected to some of the ugliest abuse from the stands.

Spence, for his part, has tried to keep the message simple and open to all. 

“If I can do it, you can do it,” he said. “Not just Muslim kids, any child of any faith.” He spoke, too, of belief in the broadest sense: whatever religion you follow, he said, just believe in God.

Quiet history-maker at World Cup

At the 2026 finals, Spence has been part of Tuchel’s squad as England chase a first World Cup since 1966, benefiting from the manager’s willingness to reward form over reputation — his versatility across both flanks a valuable asset in a tournament squad. He wears the number 25.

He carries his history lightly, in keeping with his nature. Asked whether he felt the weight of being the first of his faith to represent England, he shrugged it off: he does not, he said, feel that kind of pressure. 

He just plays football with a smile, and lets the rest take care of itself.

But the weight is there, whether he dwells on it or not. Every young British Muslim who has ever kicked a ball and wondered whether the England shirt could be for them now has an answer. 

Djed Spence took the long way round, held onto his faith through the hardest stretches, and arrived — first of his kind, and, he hopes, far from the last.