And so the juggernaut rolls on. Amid noisy celebrations in the streets of Morocco’s cities and elation in households across the Moroccan diaspora, a new set of champions have lifted the bar still higher for a nation rising rapidly in the hierarchy of the world’s most popular sport.
Morocco’s triumph, on Sunday evening in Chile, in the Fifa Under-20 World Cup is a genuine landmark and perhaps the most compelling endorsement yet of a careful plan to establish the kingdom as permanent football heavyweights.
Thanks to their 2-0 victory over Argentina in the final of the most prestigious of all tournaments for teenagers, Morocco have a gold medal to add to the pile of recent achievements.
To the successive silvers won by the senior women’s team in the last two Africa Cup of Nations, a competition traditionally dominated by sub-Saharan teams; to the bronze seized by the men, most of them under the age of 23, at last year’s Olympic Games; and, most famously, by the advance, unprecedented for any team from Africa or the Arab world, of the Atlas Lions to the semi-finals of the main World Cup three winters ago in Qatar.
The list extends, to continental and regional prizes in various age groups and will serve to up the pressure on, first, the Morocco under-17 men’s squad next month, in Qatar, for their World Cup campaign.
And then for the grown-ups, many of them emboldened by their historic adventure in 2022, when, as hosts, they carry the tag of favourites into the men’s Africa Cup of Nations starting in December. Beyond that, there’s next year’s World Cup in the Americas, and in 2030, a World Cup to be partly staged in Morocco.
Let nobody mistake the ambition around both those events. “We’re not waiting for 2030 to be world champions,” said the coach of the victorious under-20s, Mohamed Ouahbi. “We will try to be World Cup winners in 2026.”
Ouahbi, urbane, multilingual and evidently a fine motivator of young players, oversaw a tactical triumph in Santiago, the Chilean capital, having deftly negotiated a challenging route to the final.
Spain and Brazil, traditionally powerful at age-group level, were both beaten in the group phase.
The United States, with its vast pool of young talent, and France – likewise – were overcome in the knockouts and, despite conceding the greater share of possession to Argentina in Sunday’s showdown, Morocco capitalised on their slick and speedy counter-attacking.
A superb, curling direct free-kick from Yassir Zabiri, who had been fouled chasing a long pass to earn the set-piece, put Morocco 1-0 up early on. Zabiri added a second from Othmane Maamma’s cross before the half hour.
Some context here: Argentina have claimed the under-20 World Cup a record six times. They enjoyed much the greater crowd support, Chile being a neighbouring country and while Argentina might point out that eligible players such as Franco Mastantuono, of Real Madrid, and Claudio Echeverri (at Bayer Leverkusen, on loan from Manchester City) were not at the tournament because their clubs would not release them, Morocco’s pool of talent in this cohort also extends well beyond those who were there.
Leverkusen’s Eliesse Ben Seghir, Everton’s Adam Aznou and Sunderland’s Chemsdine Talbi, all of whom have won senior Atlas Lions caps, are young enough to have been selected for the under-20s had they not been needed by their clubs.
The group Ouabhi assembled so effectively speaks for the country’s depth of talent. Not least in attacking positions – and among goalkeepers.
In the hard-fought victory against France, no fewer than three different keepers were used. An injury to Yanis Benchaouch meant he had to be replaced in the second half, shortly after the French had equalised, by Ibrahim Gomis.
The score remained 1-1 after 120 minutes, when Ouabhi had a hunch that his third-pick keeper, Hakim Mesbahi might be best suited to a penalty shoot-out. Cue his hero moment: Mesbahi saved Djylian N’Guessan’s spot-kick to put Morocco into the final, where Gomis returned to keep a clean sheet.
There is a good balance, too, between native excellence and players drawn into the set-up via studious scouting and nurturing of gifted Moroccans who have spent most of their lives in Europe and usually have a choice between representing Morocco, through their heritage, or the country of their birth or long-time residence.
Maamma, voted player of the tournament in Chile, is one of five of the triumphant under-20s born in France. Marrakesh-born Zabiri, joint top scorer in the competition with five goals, is one of several of the so-called ‘Atlas Cubs’ to have passed through the admired Mohammed VI academy just outside Rabat which, over the last 15 years, has developed an outstanding reputation for cultivating fine footballers.
Ouabhi, like Walid Regragui, the head coach of the senior men’s team, regards persuading players from the diaspora to choose Morocco rather than, for example, France, Belgium or Spain as a key part of his role.
“What I do is spend time with those players and maybe with their parents,” he said, “and set out our sporting project over the short, medium and long-term.”
Famously, football’s most celebrated teenager, Lamine Yamal deliberated between Morocco, where his father’s family are from, and Spain, where he was born.
He elected to wear a Spanish jersey for his international career. But his Moroccan contemporaries are scarcely short of promise in the wing role that Lamine has so precociously mastered.
Gessime Yassine, of French club Dunkerque, and Maamma, who joined England’s Watford from France’s Montpellier in the summer stipulating that his new employer must be willing to release him for the junior World Cup, are dazzling wide players. Both seem all but certain to move upwards from their second division clubs in the near future.
If individual success at under-20 level is not always a reliable predictor of what happens to a footballer when they reach their peak years, Morocco’s young champions can look over the past roll of honour at the under-20 World Cup and take a good deal of encouragement.
In 1999 Iker Casillas and Xavi Hernandez were among Spain’s junior world champions. They went on to claim successive grown-up European Championship titles either side of winning the 2010 World Cup.
In 2005 Argentina won their fifth under-20 trophy with an outstanding teenager named as the event’s best performer. Seventeen years later, that man was receiving the biggest prize in his sport in Qatar. His name was Lionel Messi.
