France versus Morocco: Who will win in the first quarterfinal game?

The World Cup quarterfinals officially commence on Thursday when France and Morocco duke it out in Foxborough, Massachusetts.

It’s bound to be an exciting match between two heavyweights — France is currently ranked first and Morocco is sixth in FIFA’s unofficial men’s world ranking.

So what does the data say about how the game may play out?

Brennan Klein, director of Northeastern’s NetSI Sport research group, puts it bluntly.

It will largely be a battle between “Morocco’s right and France’s left,” he said.

Morocco has found success so far in the tournament by focusing its passing heavily near the upper right-hand side of the pitch.

The key to that strategy is right back and captain Achraf Hakimi, who works in close coordination with right winger Brahim Diaz, to form “the core of Morocco’s attack,” he said.

They prioritize long direct passing to create scoring opportunities. Center forward Ismael Saibari, who has scored three goals for the country in the tournament, has also been essential to this approach, often receiving the ball from the two players to create scoring chances.

That strategy has been instrumental in a number of the North African country’s goals. One exemplar showing of this strategy in action was Saibari’s goal in the first minute of the country’s group stage match against Scotland. He had received the ball after a long ball from Diaz in the right flank, Klein said.

France versus Morocco: Who will win in the first quarterfinal game?

Of the remaining teams, Morocco is ranked highest in successful dribbles, Klein said, having attempted 17.1 dribbles and successfully completing a total of 8.4.

France, by contrast, has a strong attacking left, with star players and expert sprinters such as Kylian Mbappé and Bradley Barcola, operating in that zone.

They are positioned in an ideal location to exploit a weakness in Morocco’s attacking strategy, Klein said. Because Hakimi operates so high on the right side of the pitch, Morocco’s lower right is left exposed. That’s the exact location Barcola and Mbappe are designed to intercept.

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Both players are also extremely fast, the data shows, and are likely to be a key threat for the Moroccans. Mbappé has been clocked as the fastest player of the tournament, hitting a sprint of 23.4 mph in one match. Barcola isn’t far behind, hitting a sprint of 22.7 mph in a match.

Klein said he wouldn’t be surprised if Mbappé took advantage of that exact weakness to score at least one goal in the game, which would be the 20th World Cup goal of his career. That would bring him one step closer to Lionel Messi, who so far has scored 21 goals to be the top scorer in World Cup history.

Another important consideration is that it is unclear if Saibari will recover in time for the game against France following an injury he suffered during the country’s match against Canada last week.