The Arab world has united behind giantkillers Morocco

Mad about Morocco! The Arab world has united behind the giantkillers after their shock victory over Spain… as the Atlas Lions chase history by becoming the first African nation to reach the semi-finals of the World Cup

  • Morocco stunned Spain 3-0 on penalties to reach the World Cup quarter-finals
  • Morocco became the first Arabic-speaking nation to qualify for the last eight
  • Qatar’s Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani cheered on Morocco inside the stadium
  • There was also an outpouring of joy on the streets of Brussels and in Barcelona
  • Click here for the latest World Cup 2022 news, fixtures, live action and results

Far from the surface gloss and shuttle buses of this World Cup, there was only one word on the lips of those who put their backs into building this entire show last Sunday night: Morocco.

Around 800 immigrant African and south Asian workers had gathered at the cricket stadium in Asiatown, a drab shopping and entertainment district built for them, to see if Senegal could beat England. 

It was as the place emptied, after Bukayo Saka’s goal went in, that they wanted to discuss Hakim Ziyech and Noussair Mazraoui.

Morocco stunned Spain 3-0 on penalties to seal a place in the World Cup quarter-finals

‘Morocco — they’re the ones,’ said Ganesh, who is Nepalese and in a workforce which has built hotels here. ‘Ghana are too slow. Senegal are better. But Morocco will carry the flag for us all.’

For once, in this place of obscene economic divides, there is something that the workers and the elusive Qataris, cocooned inside their 4x4s and the lobbies of the five-star hotels, can unite behind. 

With its own hapless team long gone, Qatar is appropriating Morocco — the first Arabic-speaking nation to reach a World Cup quarter-final — as one of its own.

Morocco are the first Arabic-speaking nation to reach a World Cup quarter-final in Qatar

Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani led the way, watching Tuesday’s game in the stadium, giving a thumbs up and holding the Moroccan flag. 

The Doha News trumpeted yesterday how the victorious Moroccan team had paraded the Palestinian flag, an emblem that Qatar and FIFA don’t seem so keen to purge.

The euphoria for the Atlas Lions and their manager Walid Regragui spread through Morocco’s vast diaspora like electricity on Tuesday. 

Morocco fans celebrate at full-time after pulling off a shock upset against Spain in the last-16

There was an outpouring of joy on the streets of Brussels and in Barcelona’s Raval neighbourhood, where some of the 872,000 Moroccans living in the defeated nation were singing the name of Achraf Hakimi — a match-winner born in Spain.

Tuesday was a national holiday in Spain, marking the anniversary of the day in 1978 when the country voted by referendum for a new constitution.

In the aftermath of defeat, someone edited the Wikipedia page to include the sentence: ‘It will also be remembered as the day in 2022 when Morocco knocked us out of the World Cup, and most amazingly, with a Panenka penalty scored by a guy born in Getafe.’

Hakimi, a Real Madrid academy product, went looking for his mother Saida in the stands and planted a kiss on her forehead. She cleaned houses while his father worked as a street vendor.

Achraf Hakimi went looking for his mother Saida in the stands and planted a kiss on her head

He related yesterday that he was always going to play for Morocco, despite being born on Spanish soil and tentative approaches from the Spanish Football Federation to convince him otherwise.

‘I’m a product of Moroccan culture,’ Hakimi said. ‘We always spoke Arabic at home. My mum cooked Moroccan food and I’m a practising Muslim.’

His wife Hiba Abouk, of Tunisian descent, is an actor and they appeared together on the front of Arabian Vogue before the World Cup. 

He told the magazine: ‘This is about playing for my grand- parents and for millions of Moroccans.’ He was seven when Real Madrid spotted him. Zinedine Zidane was the coach who gave him his debut.

Abdelhamid Sabiri, the former Huddersfield winger now at Sampdoria, spoke of the significance of family to this squad. ‘They mean everything to us,’ he said.

Winger Abdelhamid Sabiri (pictured) spoke of the significant of family to the Morocco squad 

Allowing parents and partners to stay at the team hotel — Doha’s Wyndham — is seen as hugely significant, creating what one observer described as ‘an adorable parent-run summer camp’.

That decision was all down to Regragui, a huge man-motivator known as ‘avocado head’ for his lack of hair, which he now self-deprecatingly wears as a nickname.

After the victory against the Belgians, he posed for FIFA with an avocado, and to celebrate victory over Canada, which secured top spot in Group F, his players stroked his pate on the pitch. ‘Maybe it will bring them luck,’ he said at that time.

Among many of the Moroccan diaspora scattered across Europe, the run to a quarter-final against Portugal has allowed concerns about inflation and entrenched poverty to fade for a time, though celebrations in Brussels have twice descended into clashes with police. 

There was a huge riot police presence in the Belgian capital on Tuesday, with missiles thrown and tear gas used.

Regragui has pleaded with perpetrators to desist. ‘I don’t think the rioters are real Moroccans,’ he said. The 47-year-old is a unifier in so many ways.

Sabiri insisted the aim for him and his team-mates was to reach the semi-finals — as well as beat Brazil. ‘We are not here just to play some nice games at the World Cup. We are here to get the maximum out of it,’ he said.

With Qatar and all the Arab world behind the team, don’t entirely bet against them. As Moroccan magazine TelQuel put it when making Regragui their cover story: ‘One team. One people.’




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