The gamble didn’t repay. Quite the opposite, it backfired badly.
Lower than 20 minutes into the most important recreation in Moroccan soccer historical past, Walid Regragui had misplaced two of the three centre-backs he had picked to face France.
Nayef Aguerd did not even make the kick-off, pressured to withdraw on the eleventh hour as a result of sickness. He was quickly joined on the bench by his captain, Romain Saiss, who pulled up whereas making an attempt and failing to maintain up with Olivier Giroud – the obvious signal of a bodily drawback potential.
The skipper’s substitution was significantly problematic as a result of it pressured Regragui into switching to a again 4, which clearly restricted Achraf Hakimi and Noussair Mazraoui’s possibilities to get ahead with out the safety of an additional centre-half to negate the risk posed by France’s fliers out large, Ousmane Dembele and Kylian Mbappe.
The previous did not take benefit however the latter actually made an impression (extra on that later), whereas the once-again wonderful Antoine Griezmann exploited the upheaval and uncertainty within the Moroccan backline inside 5 minutes and continued to trigger issues all through.
The Atlas Lions, keep in mind, hadn’t trailed as soon as on this match till Hernandez’s opener. Sadly, they’ll solely now surprise what may need occurred had all of their first-choice defenders been match…