Dean Huijsen omitted from Spain’s World Cup squad, no Real Madrid players for first time

Spain’s World Cup squad does not include any Real Madrid players for the first time in the competition’s history with defender Dean Huijsen missing out on selection for the 2026 tournament.

Luis de la Fuente will name his 26-man squad on Monday but The Athletic reported Huijsen, 21, was expected to be omitted, and this was later confirmed by the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF).

It means for the first time in their 92 years of competing at the World Cup, Spain’s squad will not feature any representatives from the country’s most decorated club. This summer’s tournament will be their 17th World Cup appearance. Spain also did not take any Madrid players to the 2020 European Championship, but there were three representatives in the country’s Euro 2024-winning squad: the departing Dani Carvajal, who did not make Spain’s provisional World Cup squad after his past two seasons were disrupted by injury, plus defender Nacho and striker Joselu, who have since left the club.

Huijsen joined Madrid from Bournemouth last summer in a £50million move and made 40 appearances in all competitions during his debut season at the Bernabeu. Madrid finished the season without a major trophy for the second successive campaign.

Having represented the Netherlands at youth level, Huijsen switched his international allegiance to Spain in 2024 and made his senior debut the following year. He has been capped seven times and started Spain’s first two World Cup qualifiers against Bulgaria and Turkey in September, but missed the remainder of the qualification campaign after being forced to withdraw from both October and November squads due to injury.

Athletic Club’s Aymeric Laporte, Barcelona’s Pau Cubarsi and Atletico Madrid’s Robin Le Normand were rotated at centre-back during Spain’s World Cup qualifiers.

Huijsen was part of the Spain squad for March’s international friendlies and played the full 90 minutes of his side’s 0-0 draw with Egypt.

Spain have been drawn alongside Cape Verde, Saudi Arabia and Uruguay in their World Cup group.