France is one win away from a feat only two nations have managed before. Kylian Mbappé missed a first-half penalty, then delivered a goal and an assist in the second, as Les Bleus beat Morocco 2-0 in Thursday’s World Cup quarterfinal at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, sending Didier Deschamps’ side into a third consecutive World Cup semifinal.
Mbappé’s spot kick in the 25th minute never had a chance. Brought down by Noussair Mazraoui inside the box, he stepped up and pushed his shot toward the corner, only for Morocco goalkeeper Yassine Bounou to guess correctly and smother it. It was the kind of moment that has derailed plenty of World Cup runs. France simply absorbed it and kept pushing.
Mbappé Answers, Then Sets Up Dembélé
The response arrived in the 60th minute, when Mbappé curled a finish around a defender that Bounou had no chance to reach. Six minutes later he turned provider, teeing up Ousmane Dembélé for the second goal that put the match away. Morocco’s best look of the night, an Achraf Hakimi free kick that whistled past the post right before halftime, was as close as they came to an equalizer.
The numbers from Gillette Stadium told the story of a lopsided game even at 2-0. France finished with 21 shots to Morocco’s 4, and an 8-1 edge in shots on target, a gap that made the scoreline feel almost conservative. France has now won all six of its matches this tournament, the only team in the field to do so without needing extra time in any of them.
Mbappé Ties Messi, Holds the Golden Boot Tiebreaker
The individual numbers are piling up fast for the France captain. His 60th-minute strike was the 20th World Cup goal of his career, pulling him within one of Lionel Messi’s career total and putting him in rare company at the tournament’s highest scoring stage. It was also his eighth goal of this World Cup alone, tying him with Messi atop the tournament’s scoring chart. Mbappé holds the Golden Boot tiebreaker for now on three assists to Messi’s one, with Dembélé, now on five goals of his own, giving Les Bleus a second scoring threat that they did not always have in earlier tournaments.
For a team already carrying the weight of a Mbappé-Dembélé partnership in full form, that kind of scoring depth is exactly what tends to separate a good tournament from a trophy. FIFA’s official match report credited both the finishing and the sheer volume of chances created as the difference in a game France controlled from the first whistle.
What Morocco’s Exit Means
For Morocco, the loss ends a bid to match or top the run that made the country a global story in 2022, when it became the first African and Arab nation to reach a World Cup semifinal. This time, the Atlas Lions arrived as reigning history-makers rather than surprise package, a status that Thursday’s quarterfinal slate made clear was no guarantee of anything once France’s attack got rolling. Morocco had already shown its knockout-round pedigree by outlasting Canada to become Africa’s first repeat quarterfinalist, a run detailed in our earlier look at how Morocco eliminated the co-hosts, but a fully fit, in-form France team proved to be a different level of challenge entirely.
A Third Straight Final Would Be Historic
The bigger prize now sits within reach. If France beats the winner of Spain and Belgium in Tuesday’s semifinal at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, it would reach its third consecutive World Cup final, following the 2018 title and the 2022 final loss to Argentina on penalties. That would put Les Bleus in company shared by only two other nations in the tournament’s history. West Germany reached three straight finals from 1982 through 1990, and Brazil did it from 1994 through 2002. No team has managed the feat since, which is part of why the current French generation, built around Mbappé, Dembélé and a defense that has barely been tested, is drawing comparisons to those sides.
None of that is decided yet. Spain and Belgium still have to settle their own quarterfinal, and a semifinal against either opponent will look nothing like the mismatch France just produced against Morocco. But for a team that has now scored in every match it has played this summer and leans on two attackers both scoring at a near-record pace, the path to Arlington looks as open as any in the bracket. More quarterfinal fallout and full coverage of the run to the final is available on the Playbook Wire Soccer hub.
