Top 10 players we can’t believe are playing at their first World Cup: Diaz, Isak…

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Planet Football

·8 Juni 2026

Top 10 players we can’t believe are playing at their first World Cup: Diaz, Isak…

With the World Cup‘s expansion to 48 teams, there were always bound to be some newbies at this summer’s tournament.

But that’s even true within the squads of some of the bigger nations. So we’ve picked out our top 10 players we can’t believe are only just going to their first World Cup now.

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This isn’t where you’ll find your Lamine Yamals, your Desire Doues and so on. They’re obviously young and we very much can believe that they didn’t go to previous World Cups as children.

Instead, these are 10 players who’ve been established for a long time but are only now about to make their World Cup debuts.

Just to be clear, we’re ranking them on how much we can’t believe they haven’t played at a World Cup before – not purely how good they are.

10. Franck Kessie

It feels like Ivory Coast are one of the likelier African nations to reach the World Cup, having done so three times consecutively between 2006 and 2014.

But they didn’t qualify for the World Cups in 2018 or 2022, when Kessie was playing his club football for AC Milan and Barcelona respectively.

Kessie was one of the best midfielders in Serie A when he was at Milan and was named in the team of the tournament for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations, which Ivory Coast won.

Still only 29 and now plying his trade for Al-Ahli in the Saudi Pro League, Kessie will captain Ivory Coast at their first World Cup in over a decade.

9. Florian Wirtz

Wirtz is one of the younger ones we’re including here and that’s because he was already well-known by the time of the last World Cup.

After becoming Bayer Leverkusen’s youngest ever debutant in May 2020, he got his first senior Germany call-up in March 2021, but had to wait until that September for his first cap.

Wirtz scored double figures of goals in the 2021-22 season, but missed the World Cup in Qatar due to an ACL injury.

He isn’t carrying the best of form at Liverpool with him to this World Cup, but he does have three goals from three games for Germany in 2026.

8. Reece James

England have always been well-stocked at right-back in recent years, but James wasn’t in the 2022 World Cup squad.

We can’t say the reason why is too unbelievable, to be honest – he was injured. But after his busiest season in four years for Chelsea, he has a good chance of regular starts for Thomas Tuchel’s Three Lions this summer.

7. Alexander Isak

We could have gone with either Isak or his fellow Swedish striker Viktor Gyokeres to illustrate this point, but the former was a bigger name at the time of the last World Cup, playing for Newcastle and not Coventry.

Trouble was, not only was Isak injured at the time, but Sweden didn’t qualify for Qatar anyway.

With Isak now at Liverpool and Gyokeres at Arsenal, Sweden have developed enough firepower to earn their place at the 2026 World Cup. Check out the former’s goal against Norway as an example.

Isak, who’d even earned his first two Sweden caps before the 2018 World Cup but wasn’t in their squad for that tournament, will be hoping to put a tough first season as the most expensive player in British football history behind him this summer.

6. Erling Haaland

He’s been one of the best strikers on the planet this decade, if not the best of them all. He’s already Norway’s all-time record scorer, but this will be the first time Haaland has a chance of representing them at a World Cup.

Norway actually haven’t qualified for one since 1998 until now, but they’ve built up an increasing amount of talent, also including Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard.

It would have been a huge injustice for a striker as elite as Haaland to never get the chance to play at a World Cup. Thankfully, here he is.

5. Hakan Calhanoglu

A player with more than 100 Bundesliga appearances and more than 200 Serie A appearances, Calhanoglu will captain Turkey this summer.

The attacking midfielder, who’s been playing for Inter Milan for the past five years, made his international debut even before the 2014 World Cup.

However, Turkey have only just qualified for their first World Cup in that timeframe.

Calhanoglu now boasts more than 100 caps for his country and has played at three Euros, but will now lead what’s surprisingly only the third Turkish team to reach a World Cup ever.

4. Ronald Araujo

Bit of a technicality this one, as Araujo was named in the Uruguay squad for the 2022 World Cup, but he didn’t play.

The Barcelona defender was recovering from an injury and hoped to be fit in time for the knockout stage.

Alas, Uruguay were knocked out in the group stage.

Barcelona captain Araujo will be hoping to help them avoid a similar fate this time around.

3. Gabriel

If you’d have asked us which of Arsenal’s centre-back partnership had played at a World Cup before, we’d have guessed Gabriel over William Saliba.

Turns out a 21-year-old Saliba came on as a sub in France’s last group game in Qatar, just as his Arsenal career was getting going.

But the more senior Gabriel hadn’t even made his Brazil debut by the time of the 2022 World Cup, even though he was already a couple of years into his Arsenal spell by then.

Now he’s regarded as one of the best defenders in the world and heads to the World Cup as a Premier League champion.

2. Fabian Ruiz

Ruiz was a massive part of the PSG squad that won the treble in 2024-25, on the back of his success with Spain at Euro 2024.

The midfielder didn’t play quite as much this season, but still helped PSG retain their Ligue 1 and Champions League crowns.

Given how good he was at Euro 2024 – being named in the team of the tournament – it’s surprising that this will be Ruiz’s first World Cup.

He actually didn’t receive any call-ups at all throughout 2022 (having previously played 15 times for his country after making his name at Napoli) before working his way back into the Spain picture.