The incessant honking of cars, the explosions of fireworks, smashed vehicles and shop windows – this is not the culmination of a general strike, which has been a common occurrence in France in recent years. This is the reaction of a multinational country to the entry of the Morocco national team into the semifinals of the World Cup.
This is the first time an African team has gone so far on the road to becoming the strongest team in the world. The piquancy of this situation was added by the fact that the entire Maghreb, including the large Arab diaspora in France, pledged to celebrate the historic milestone.
In Paris, the police had to use tear gas against an angry mob who wreaked havoc in their path. The inhabitants of Nice did not sleep all night to the accompaniment of loud celebrations from Moroccan fans. And Marseille met Morocco’s minimal victory over Portugal (1:0) with unrest.
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No major tournament is complete without sensation. At Euro 2016, Iceland wrote a football fairy tale, in 2018 the whole world was surprised by Croatia, Euro 2020 was the peak for Denmark, and at the current Mundial no one will surpass Morocco for sure.
Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Walid Regragi
By the laws of logic, the Moroccan team did not even shine outside the group in the playoffs. On the eve of the start of the tournament in Qatar, the team changed its coach: instead of Vahid Halilhodzic, who quarreled with the Moroccan association and the leader of the national team, Hakim Ziyech, the coaching post was taken by Walid Regragi . Under his leadership, the Atlas Lions managed to play only a few friendly matches.
The Moroccans ended up in a frankly difficult group, from which hardly anyone predicted their exit from first place in the round of 16. But the reality turned out that Belgium was mired in conflicts and failed in Qatar, and Canada received excellent press on the style of the game, but the skill level of the performers was not enough for three matches.
And now the Moroccan team is among the four best teams in the world. How did she do it anyway?
Walid Regraga’s team has already played five matches at the 2022 World Cup. And in 480 minutes I conceded only once, and then because of an own goal. This is the most reliable defense in the tournament right now. The Tunisian team also missed a goal, but could not even break through the group barrier.
Throughout the tournament, the Moroccan national team uses a 4-1-4-1 game system, which transforms into 4-3-3 in attack and 4-5-1 in defense.
The team is consistently compact defensively and prevents more penetrating passes thanks to the two defensive lines and Sofian Amrabat, who usually sits between them and throws key interceptions. The 26-year-old Amrabat is the opener of the championship and will certainly get into the symbolic team, after which he will certainly change Fiorentina to a more eminent European big.
The Moroccans play low block and rely on deterring opponents’ attacks. It cannot be otherwise when you face teams like Spain and Portugal, who force most of their game time to work without the ball. That didn’t deprive both teams of scoring chances, but it limited their attacking options, restricting them to long shots and flanking crosses.
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But Morocco is not about the “parked bus”, but about intelligent containment. The semi-finalists of the 2022 World Cup did their best to avoid one-on-one situations as much as possible, in which the highest level of individual skill from European teams wins. Additionally, Regraga’s wards threw the most interceptions in the first third of the field and avoided fouls in danger zones near their own goal.
But even the implementation of the coach’s ideas in defense did not guarantee the transition to the semifinals for the Moroccans, but the reliable performance of Yassin Bunu at the last frontier made it possible. Neither Spain nor Portugal have found a lock pick for the Moroccan bib and have already taken off from the battle for the trophy.
At the same time, against the Portuguese, the Moroccan team had only 28.04% of ball possession. But this team has players with the right characteristics that allow the Africans to counterattack successfully.
The only goal in Morocco’s match against Portugal came from the right wing thanks to a diagonal from Yahya Alla and an outstanding jump and header from En-Nesiri. Admittedly, this goal was facilitated by an outgoing mistake by goalkeeper Diogo Costa, but in this goal lies the essence of Moroccan hopes on the counterattack: speed in the transition phases, creative thinking and the technique of the wing forwards (Hakim Ziyech and Sofyan Bufal ) and center forward En-Nesiri’s search for scoring chances.
In the duels with the Spaniards and Portuguese, the Moroccans also built their plans in the opposing half of the field around the flank-to-belt diagonals to create numerical superiority for the forwards. Passing in high-speed dribbling from the wing to the center are the trademarks of Ziyech and Bufal, who can both make a canopy towards the center and execute a wide shot on goal.
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However, one shouldn’t idealize the Moroccan team’s performance at the 2022 World Cup. The Atlas Lions realized 200% of their tactical ideas in previous games, but were also helped to reach the semi-finals by the poor conversion of opponents’ scoring chances .
France themselves demonstrate a much more effective game in attack, taking advantage of the variability in the final stages. Kylian Mbappe has already scored 5 goals in the tournament, but if you close the French winger, then the “tricolors” also have Olivier Giroud, whose scoring talent brought the reigning world champions 4 more goals.
The Moroccan national team achieved much more than expected in this tournament. And the Regraga wards will still have at least 90 minutes of fighting France to continue their enchanting performance in the league, as this may not happen again in the foreseeable future.
Both teams are on the verge of historic milestones. France can reach the final and will be one step away from defending the title of the strongest team in the world. The Moroccan team has already jumped over their heads, and these guys have nothing to lose, and the African team has never been represented in the World Cup finals.
So on Wednesday, literally and figuratively, a fiery match is expected. Whoever emerges victorious from this semi-final, France are sure to be on fire, and this is the case where a performance off the football pitch can easily eclipse the sporting spectacle afforded by two semi-finalists.
“It’s going to be a civil war” – in France expect the worst, but hope for the best. After all, football was created to leave emotion in the game and not bring destructiveness into everyday life.
