FIFA revised the rules at their Extraordinary Congress on 19 October 2003. The deal now is that players with dual nationalities can switch nationality provided they haven’t played in a full, senior international “A” game.

They have to apply to switch nationalities before their 21st birthday and can only switch nationalities once.

Here is the relevant FIFA docuemnt. If you click that be warned that it’s a hefty pdf file, and the relevant bit is on page 60.

So in terms of playing for the Netherlands Under-21 team Owusu Abeyie should be OK. The real problem is the question of when his application was submitted. He’s 22 now but the claim is that Ghana submitted the application before April 15th 2006, which was Owusu Abeyie’s 21st birthday.

As for Quincy Owusu Abeyie, FIFA aren’t expected to make a decision until after the January 10th roster submission deadline, so Ghana will be naming him to the roster and then getting a decision sometime between the Janury 10th and 20th (this article says FIFA meet five days before the tournament starts so I guess the 15th.) If it’s bad news then they’ll have to pay a fine to replace him.