Morocco Coach Criticizes 48-Team Format as Team Faces Netherlands in Highly Anticipated Match

Little wonder then that Mohamed Ouahbi, the Morocco head coach, said the 48-team format was “not ideal”. Unbeaten in three group games, including a draw with Brazil, Morocco’s reward is a meeting with the Netherlands, a match-up that pits teams ranked six and seven in the world against each other in Monterrey for a match that starts at 9am on Tuesday, Hong Kong time. “Other big teams are facing small fry,” one Moroccan journalist lamented at a press conference where there was standing room only by the time Ouahbi and his goalkeeper, Yassine Bounou, took their seats. One of the most keenly anticipated second-round matches of this tournament will happen 30 years to the day that a Dutch side captained by current boss Ronald Koeman beat Morocco 2-1 in a World Cup group game, when anything other than that outcome would have qualified as a surprise. The Morocco of today are a far more competitive and talented proposition. This contest, in the words of Bounou, is “a clash of the titans”, lent extra spice by the close ties between the countries.