Morocco Makes History by Becoming the First African Nation to Reach World Cup Semi-Finals
Photo from Francois Nel
Edited by Michelle Ho
Morocco will advance to the FIFA World Cup 2022 Qatar semi-finals, after a historic win against Portugal. Morocco won the match 1-0 and has become the first-ever African team to make it this far in the World Cup. Prior to this year’s World Cup, only 3 African nations were able to make it to the quarter-finals, Cameroon in 1990, Senegal in 2002, and most recently, Ghana in 2010. However, none of them made it any further in the competition.
Portugal, with fan favourite Cristiano Ronaldo, was favoured to win the match but struggled to get past Moroccan’s strong defence. Youssef En-Nesyri gave Moroccan fans the moment of glory when he headed in Yahya Attiat-Allah’s cross in the 42nd minute. According to beIN Sports, En-Nesyri jumped a staggering 2.78 metres (9.12 feet) when he scored the header.
The Moroccan team’s impressive win streak now spans 5 games and is credited to its strong defence, especially goalkeeper Yassine Bounou, who managed to maintain 4 clean sheets in 5 matches, against the strong squads of Croatia, Belgium, Spain, and Portugal. The squad have only conceded one goal in this World Cup, which was an own goal against Canada.
Morocco will now face the reigning champions France in the semi-finals on 15th December at 3:00 AM (HKT).
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