Juanlu Sanchez came off the bench to lead Spain to the Paris 2024 Olympic football final for a record-equalling fifth time, after beating Morocco 2-1 in the Olympic semi-final.
The Spanish national team is preparing to face either Egypt or France in the Olympic final, while the Moroccan national team will play for the bronze medal, after failing to maintain its lead against Spain with a goal from the top scorer in football, Soufiane Rahimi, from the penalty spot.
Morocco played in front of a large crowd of Moroccan fans, who made the match seem like it was in Rabat, as the Moroccan community is the second largest community in Marseille after the Algerian community.
No papers on the bench
Until the 88th minute of the match, the Moroccan team had not made any changes, and ended the match with only one change compared to 5 changes for Spain in the two teams’ match in the Olympic semi-finals. The reason is that the Moroccan team did not have any winning cards on the bench, especially on the offensive side.
Perhaps the right thing to do would have been not to play all the attacking cards at once. For example, it would have been possible not to play Elias Ben Seghir, especially since he played at the expense of Bilal El Khannous in position 10, which is not his original position.
A huge, incomprehensible decline
Morocco’s average possession win against Spain was just 30 metres from their goal, their closest in Olympic games so far, and it was incomprehensible why Morocco had fallen so far behind.
The Spanish team forced the Moroccan team to retreat defensively, but Morocco had to resort at times to advanced pressure and push its defense forward. For example, the first goal came because Zakaria El Wahidi made a mistake in a dangerous area due to the delay of the defensive block.
Morocco paid the price for individual mistakes in the Olympic semi-finals
There are more than one factor in Morocco’s loss, including the inaccuracy of the shots. The two teams took 14 shots, but only one shot for Morocco was between the three posts, which was the goal ball from a penalty kick, compared to 4 for Spain.
But the biggest reason is that Morocco paid the price for individual mistakes in Spain’s two goals, and here we explain them with pictures. First, in the first goal (in the picture above), in which more than one mistake occurred. First: The Spain player was alone behind the lines.
The second mistake in the first goal was the left back Zakaria Al-Wahidi’s slowness in clearing the ball, which led to him losing it and Fermin Lopez scoring the first goal from it.
In the second goal in the image above, it is clear how slack Morocco winger Abdessamad Ezzalzouli was in his comeback with Juanlu, who cut inside unmolested and fired home the winner.
La Masia School is strongly present
There were 8 La Masia graduates in today’s match, for example Elias Akhomach was a teammate of Fermin Lopez, Pablo Barrios, Samu Omorodion, Torrientes, Iturbe and Juanlu.
Barcelona gained from this tournament a player like Fermin Lopez, who scored and assisted today. He is one of the stars of the tournament and the first key for the Spanish national team. Despite playing behind the striker, he enjoyed great freedom, even the second goal he assisted came while he was on the right side.
Tactical fouls are an effective tool for the Spanish national team
Spain’s midfield was forced to resort to committing mistakes to restrict the Moroccan passing movement, and thwarted Moroccan counterattacks before they could happen.
For example, Adrian Bernabé had to make a mistake to prevent Rahimi from running towards the goal in the 76th minute, and he received a yellow card and the Moroccan players exploded with anger; this was a clear way for the Spanish team to deprive Morocco of quick counterattacks.
