Having reached the knockout rounds for the first time in the millennium, the US Men’s Olympic Team will face off against surprising Group B winners Morocco, with a spot in the semifinal on the line.
A strong turnaround following the tournament-opening blowout by France saw Marko Mitrović’s team similarly beat both New Zealand and Guinea by identical three-goal margins, finishing group play with a respectable record of six points and a total of seven goals scored.
There will be fair questions about whether this was merely a product of their opening opponent being by far the toughest of the group, in addition to being tournament hosts and one of the three pre-tournament heavy favorites, or if the team simply settled down and fixed some of their issues in front of both goals during the following days.
The optimistic side of the coin, which should the going viewpoint of both fans and the players at this win-or-go-home stage of the tournament, would be the latter, particularly considering that the 3-0 edge by the French in the opener undoubtedly flattered the hosts – who themselves were lucky to narrowly beat Guinea three days later.
This should give the team some measure of cautious confidence heading into the quarterfinal in Paris, where they will go up against a Morocco team that barely edged group B over Argentina, who were one of the gold-medal favorites prior to the tournament. In fact, the Moroccans beat Argentina in the opener by a 2-1 margin, after a controversial series of events led to a chaotic and protracted ending.
However, they are far from invincible as their follow-up 2-1 loss to Ukraine would indicate, even if it took a 98th-minute winner by the opposition to take the win.
It would be fair to say that, in addition to the French, Morocco are the de facto home team of the tournament, due to the participation of several French-born or French-based players, as well as the country’s sizeable diaspora in France numbering close to one million and the longstanding cultural ties between the two nations.
The two biggest threats for the Moroccans throughout the first three games have been, unsurprisingly, two of their overage players, namely Soufiane Rahimi and PSG star Achraf Hakimi. Rahimi has been top scorer of the tournament so far with four goals, with Hakimi being a standout at right back, taking man-of-the-match honors in the final group game against Iraq.
Rahimi will undoubtedly provide the biggest test so far of the tournament for the American central defensive pairing of Walker Zimmerman and Miles Robinson, who have been solid in the latter two group games.
In the midfield, Moroccan-American-French multi-national Amir Richardson has emerged as one of their better performers, with a goal in their final group game and a generally strong showing behind the attacking front. He is, however, one of six Moroccan players on a yellow card, including the prolific Rahimi, which might force some degree of caution as they have their own eyes on a semifinal berth.
Their defense will have to contend with an American attack which has been running on all cylinders and scoring in bunches over their last 180 minutes of play. Mitrović’s team has come out of the gates strongly against both New Zealand and Guinea, scoring a combined five goals during the first 30 minutes of the two games.
Djordje Mihailovic has been responsible for the opening goal in both games, striking a penalty in the eighth minute against the New Zealanders, and striking a spectacular 14th-minute free kick against Guinea. These goals, combined with early strikes from the likes of Zimmerman, Gianluca Busio and Kevin Paredes, have essentially set the tone of each game and left their two opponents chasing the game earlier than they would have preferred.
Repeating the feat against the generally high-quality Moroccan defense will be a touch more challenging, however with Paredes, Griffin Yow and Paxten Aaronson all clicking, and Mihailovic proving dangerous in dead-ball situations, fireworks can be expected.
Mitrović will likely have to be without Busio due to injury; his presence will be especially missed after an unconvincing performance by Maximilian Dietz in his place, so another midfield shift, albeit one that still has captain Tanner Tessmann in the pivotal role, could be in the cards.
In the end, Mitrović has been largely successful with his tactics, even including the first hour of the game against France, so an whichever adjustments are necessary to deal with Rahimi and the rest of the Moroccan threat will be taken.
Paredes, Tessmann, and Dietz are the only American players on yellows and at risk of missing a potential semifinal against either Japan or Spain.
The game kicks off in the Parc des Princes in Paris at 3pm local time, 9am Eastern US time.
