FIFA 23 gets updated to include Nouhaila Benzina's hijab after she wore one at the World Cup

Morocco’s Nouhaila Benzina made history last month by becoming the first player to wear a hijab at a World Cup during her team’s 1-0 victory against South Korea.

And now FIFA 23 has updated her player model to include it.

The wearing of head coverings for religious reasons was authorised by FIFA in 2014 and the 25-year-old defender wore a white Islamic headscarf as she played the entire match.

After the game, Muslim women around the world praised Benzina for her courage and being a role model to young girls.

“Girls will look at Benzina (and think) ‘That could be me,’” Assmaah Helal, a co-founder of the Muslim Women in Sports Network told reporters.

“Also the policymakers, the decision-makers, the administrators will say, ‘We need to do more in our country to create these accepting and open and inclusive spaces for women and girls to participate in the game.’”

EA Sports have introduced the hijab in FIFA 23 for Morocco's Nouhaila Benzina🇲🇦

She is the first player to wear hijab at the Women's World Cup.

Benzina’s and now EA’s impact will have an entire demographic of football fans and players being represented on the biggest stage👏 pic.twitter.com/v3vnTQvXs8

— FUTBIN (@FUTBIN) August 9, 2023

Yasmin Rahman, who plays for Saltley Stallions in Birmingham, told BBC Newsbeat that when she was growing up she had no Muslim female football players to look up to.

"Little me is screaming 'oh my gosh', finally now a hijab at the level of the World Cup and being globally recognised," the 23-year-old said.

Yasmin's teammate, Asma Hassan, told the publication: "If I had seen someone like that [Benzina] when I was younger, it might have pushed me to play football at a younger age.

"It's so nice to see someone that looks like you. She's really a role model to us."

FIFA 23 announced this week that they had updated Benzina's player model to include a hijab.

Alongside general visual changes like updates for 'boots, gloves, kits, tifos, and VIP Areas' and an issue in Volta where controller settings would reset to the default scheme, the developers said they have 'updated Nouhalia Benzina’s player model to include her head covering'.

The update for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One rolled out on August 4.