{"id":532298,"date":"2026-07-09T03:14:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/532298\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T03:14:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:14:17","slug":"frances-deschamps-unruffled-by-argentinian-officials-helming-morocco-quarter-final-world-cup-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/532298\/","title":{"rendered":"France\u2019s Deschamps unruffled by Argentinian officials helming Morocco quarter-final | World Cup 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Didier Deschamps has insisted he is not concerned by the \u00adappointment of\u00a0Argentinian officials to oversee the World Cup quarter-final between France and Morocco on Thursday, with a repeat of the 2022 final<\/a> against Argentina still possible. \u201cWe have to deal with it,\u201d he said. \u201cI trust the referees. Our opponent is Morocco, not the referee.\u201d<\/p>\n

The France head coach, though, is not a natural diplomat. This was a characteristically \u00adcombative \u00addisplay from Deschamps, who spent at least 90 seconds at the end of his press conference explaining why he really did not have time to answer one final question, before reluctantly \u00adanswering, grumpily. He\u00a0could not resist a jibe at those, many in the north \u00adAfrican media, who had \u00adcriticised the French official \u00adFran\u00e7ois \u00adLetexier\u2019s performance during the last-16 game between Argentina and\u00a0Egypt<\/a> on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s hope ours are as good as Monsieur Letexier was,\u201d he said. He was also scornful of questions from a Moroccan journalist about a \u00adpenalty that might have been awarded for a possible foul on Sofiane Boufal in the World Cup semi-final<\/a> between the sides in 2022.<\/p>\n

Integrity has been a recurring theme recently and the \u00adappointment of Facundo Tello to referee the game with two Argentinian assistants, an Argentinian reserve assistant and an Argentinian fourth official raised \u00adeyebrows. Argentina were \u00adoutraged by a \u2013 widely misconstrued \u2013 \u00adcomment from Kylian Mbapp\u00e9 before the last tournament about European successes at recent World Cups, which in part provoked a \u00adracist chant<\/a> that formed part of their \u00advictory celebrations after the final in Doha. The years since have been characterised by pointed remarks from both sides.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been a certain bitterness for a few years now since the last final, but that\u2019s part of the game,\u201d said France\u2019s reserve goalkeeper Robin Risser, although he sought to play down an issue that has erupted on social media. \u201cIf these referees are there, it\u2019s because they\u2019re up to the level of the competition.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the same time, the repercussions of the bruising last-16 win against Paraguay<\/a> have carried on, with Celeste Amarilla, a senator for Paraguay\u2019s Liberal Radical party, deleting social media posts in which she racially abused Mbapp\u00e9, whose penalty won the game for France, but demanding an apology for the Real Madrid forward dismissing her as \u201ca despicable woman\u201d<\/a> who was \u201cunworthy of your position\u201d. The Paraguayan government and Fifa condemned Amarilla, and French prosecutors are investigating.<\/p>\n

France\u2019s players had shown remarkable self-control against Paraguay, and their federation had indicated its disdain for the machinations<\/a> that led to the USA forward Folarin Balogun\u2019s one-match ban for his red card against Bosnia and Herzegovina<\/a> being suspended by appealing against a yellow card shown to Michael Olise. The Bayern Munich forward was booked after the Paraguay midfielder Mat\u00edas Galarza threw himself to the ground clutching his face when replays clearly showed Olise had done no more than grab his shirt.<\/p>\n

Mohamed Ouahbi believes Morocco and France have both \u2018evolved\u2019 since their World Cup semi-final in 2022. Photograph: H\u00e9ctor Vivas\/FIFA\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Deschamps confirmed, though, that Fifa has said the yellow card stands; there was no invoking of article 27 of the disciplinary code as there had been in the case of Balogun, seemingly after the intervention of Donald Trump.<\/p>\n

France\u2019s head coach was keen to underline how difficult an opponent Morocco will be. \u201cThey don\u2019t have the profile of Paraguay,\u201d he said. \u201cWe will need to be very effective because this Morocco is of very high quality. The level rises as you climb the mountain. Mindset doesn\u2019t win matches but it can make you lose them.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Given he will leave the France job after this tournament, the quarter-final could be Deschamps\u2019 farewell. \u201cThe goal is to do everything to make sure it goes well,\u201d he said. \u201cThat is the only thing driving me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mohamed Ouahbi, meanwhile, was reluctant to claim too much credit for what his Morocco side has achieved so far. \u201cI don\u2019t like this feeling that we can say what we have done is great and everything now is a bonus,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have to think about winning this game. The only bonus is winning the World Cup<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like Deschamps \u2013 although in a far more gracious way \u2013 he dismissed the significance to this game of that semi-final four years ago. \u201cThe Morocco side and the France side have both evolved,\u201d he said, \u201cand the level of both is improved compared to four years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

Most of Ouahbi\u2019s press conference, in fact, was spent playing down suggestions everything is stacked against Morocco. They have travelled roughly six times as far as France so far, but as Ouahbi pointed out, that was the result of a random draw and, to an extent, they have paid a price for finishing second in their group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Didier Deschamps has insisted he is not concerned by the \u00adappointment of\u00a0Argentinian officials to oversee the World Cup…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532299,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-532298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}