Morocco didn’t fluke their way to top of their group — why Spain will struggle to infiltrate their defence

The Athletic has live coverage of Morocco vs. Spain in Round of 16 play at the 2022 World Cup. 

In 1986, Morocco became the first African nation to top their group at the World Cup. Thirty-six years later, only two other nations from the continent have replicated that — Cameroon in 1990 and Nigeria in 1994 and 1998.

Last Thursday, Morocco repeated the trick, topping Group F that contained Canada, Belgium and Croatia. Moroccan expectations were low when it came to qualifying from such a tough group, let alone topping it. Achraf Hakimi, their star full-back who plays his club football for Paris Saint-Germain, certainly didn’t see it coming.

So, how did they do it?

For all the big names in this Morocco squad, it’s their organisation off the ball in open play that makes them so hard to beat and painful to play against. Players like Hakim Ziyech and Sofiane Boufal are known for flair and ability on the ball, but in Morocco’s three unbeaten games so far they also showed their defensive contributions.

The underlying numbers (2.9 xGA) show that Morocco aren’t the most solid team out there, but most of the high-quality chances Morocco have allowed were from defensive set pieces. It is an area they should improve in.

In open play, it’s a different story. Croatia, Belgium and Canada had trouble breaking down this Moroccan side and in each game the defensive approach was different.

Against Croatia, Morocco focused on nullifying Croatia’s midfield trio of Luka Modric, Marcelo Brozovic and Mateo Kovacic. Shaping up in their regular 4-3-3, Youssef En-Nesyri regularly adjusted his positioning to block the passing lane into Brozovic. Behind him, Azzedine Ounahi and Selim Amallah were marking Modric and Kovacic. That left Sofyan Amrabat in a free role to sweep behind the front five.

Croatia couldn’t access their midfield trio freely and the result was that Modric had to drop deeper into a right-back position to receive the ball in space.

Even when Andrej Kramaric tried to drop from his centre-forward position to provide a passing option, he was easily covered by Amrabat. By using En-Nesyri to mark Brozovic or block the passing lane into the Inter Milan midfielder, Amrabat was free to pick up any player moving into his zone.

And when Morocco wanted to be more aggressive and press Croatia, the shifting of markers was smooth as they already had a free player in Amrabat. In this example, En-Nesyri is blocking the passing lane into Brozovic while Ounahi and Amallah are marking Kovacic and Modric respectively.

When Ounahi moves up to press Josko Gvardiol, Amrabat drops onto Kovacic and with En-Nesyri glued to Brozovic, Gvardiol has to play the pass backwards.

This continued throughout the game…

… and despite Zlatko Dalic’s introduction of Mario Pasalic to play as a right-winger moving inside to overload the midfield, Croatia failed to penetrate Morocco’s block. That’s simply because when Amallah was dragged out towards Modric, Amrabat was always ready to shift to cover his position.

Here, Modric is in a right-back position to escape the marking. As Amallah moves up to press, En-Nesyri drops to block the passing lane into Brozovic, but Modric finds the pass in between them. Before Modric plays the pass though, Amrabat (yellow) is anticipating the situation and is ready to move across if the pass goes through…

… so when it does, he is in a good position to pounce. Ounahi marking Kovacic on the other side also allows Amrabat to be as aggressive as he wants…

… and the Fiorentina midfielder manages to intercept Brozovic’s pass into Pasalic.

In their second game, Morocco tweaked their defensive shape to accommodate Belgium’s 3-2-4-1.

The adjustment was to push Noussair Mazraoui forward, closer to Kevin De Bruyne, to prevent him from being a free option and to match the four midfielders from Belgium.

This way, Morocco had De Bruyne and Eden Hazard covered, with Mazraoui pushing to mark the Manchester City player and Amrabat free to shift to the right to mark Hazard.

Belgium’s solution was to use their wing-backs to free De Bruyne, but Morocco had this covered. When Thomas Meunier pushed forward, Mazraoui had to move away from De Bruyne, and with Amrabat closer to Hazard…

… it was Boufal who dropped to mark De Bruyne, allowing Mazraoui to move out wide to press Meunier…

… while keeping Amrabat in his place, screening the defensive line and being close to Hazard.

Boufal and Mazraoui helped Amrabat massively, allowing him to focus on Hazard and not get dragged all over the midfield. When Amrabat was far, Boufal knew when to tuck inside to block the passing lane into De Bruyne…

… and Mazraoui knew when to push forward to mark De Bruyne.

Then after Morocco scored their first goal of the game, Regragui introduced the defender Jawad El Yamiq, which meant moving to a 5-4-1.

The defensive tweaks against Belgium quietened the threat of De Bruyne and Hazard throughout the game — the second game in a row when Morocco’s organisation without the ball limited their opponents’ most impactful players.

The standings of the group after the second round meant that Morocco only needed a draw against Canada to qualify, and on evidence of previous games, it was highly probable. In that game, Morocco showed they can attack through the wide areas.

Defensively, Canada’s 4-2-3-1 in possession played into Morocco’s hands. Amrabat only had Junior Hoilett to mark, while Ounahi and Abdelhamid Sabiri were on Mark-Anthony Kaye and Jonathan Osorio.

John Herdman’s switch midway through the first half to a back three in possession provided a different problem for Morocco. But their awareness and ability in terms of shifting markers from one player to another stopped Canada from creating any clear-cut chances.

Despite that, Canada were close to equalising through a corner. In all three games, Morocco’s defensive corners have been their Achilles’ heel. Their man-marking approach (red) makes it easier for opponents to create a free man.

This aspect of their defensive game is where Morocco should improve moving forward, especially with the rise of set pieces throughout the world.

Up next is the opponent no one wants to face: Spain. Yet, this won’t be a walk in the park for Luis Enrique’s side.