France and Morocco do not like to hold the ball in the 2022 World Cup

*France - Morocco: 2pm on Thursday 15/12, on MetaSports.

For most of the quarter-final against France, England took the initiative to hold the ball. They do pretty much everything they want with the ball at their feet: organize attacks from the back, move forward leisurely and coordinate actively all over the pitch.

With a superior ball control ratio, England's number of successful passes is no less than 100 times more than France's and is barely close to the home field. However, he lost the battle.

That was the French intention. The defending world champion won 2-1 to reach the semi-finals against Morocco, repeating a fast counter-attack. With fast attacking players, France does their job perfectly. "We knew they wanted to hold the ball so we actively waited for the opportunity and kicked the counter-attack," midfielder Adrien Rabiot said of England. "France knows how to adapt to circumstances."

Filled with attacking talent in the squad, France is just two wins away from the world championship. After Brazil in 1958 and 1962, they will become the first team in 60 years to win the world championship twice in a row. But Les Bleus accomplishes this task by staying away from active possession. They took shelter, causing the opponent to attack, playing like a "bottom door" team like Morocco in this tournament, but completely different in mentality.

While France refuses to utilize its overwhelming talent pool to corner opponents in matches, Morocco simply has no choice.

France has completely changed after about 15 years of falling into trying to hold the ball more than its opponents. They choose the most humble approach despite possessing the world's top stars in every position on the field. "We knew we would be very dangerous on the counter-attack," striker Olivier Giroud - who had only 23 touches against England but still scored the decisive goal - said of the home team's toy intentions. "It is still important to handle the details in the game well. We promote our ability in many areas of the field."

France scored twice against England after just five shots on target. Their expected goal count, an indicator of each team's potential to score in matches, is just 1.4. The opportunities created are also not really obvious. This whole tournament, France played like that. They stay away from the ball and wait for an opportunity to counterattack. The average position of the team is only about 40 meters from the goal, according to statistics firm Opta. Imposing offensive teams such as Germany or Spain have formation blocks about four meters higher.

Les Bleus is also in the group of teams that give the opponent the most space above and allow the opponent to pass the most in the 2022 World Cup. They are among the top six teams in this respect including Australia, Costa Rica, Japan, Poland and Ghana.

The most important difference between France and these teams is that they can change the way they play at any time. Every member of the squad is top class, enough to be a great passer if needed. Most French players now play for the best ball control teams in Europe and even top in the Champions League. It's just that when wearing the national team shirt, under the direction of Didier Deschamps, these players crouch like predatory snakes, waiting for the time before they can counterattack with lightning attacks.

Four years ago, France used the same approach in Russia. Despite having a squad worth more than a billion dollars, coach Deschamps chose a pragmatic approach. France actively retreated deep with two defensive midfielders. They controlled the ball for an average of 48 percent of the tournament and Deschamps was criticized for wasting the talent at hand when not playing in control. But at the end of the tournament, it was very difficult to argue with him. France won the world championship for the second time in history.

"This spirit reminds me of what happened in 2018," Giroud emphasized last Saturday.

Not surprisingly, Deschamps chose to organize this team. He played as a defensive midfielder, captaining the France squad that won the 1998 World Cup and the European Championship in 2000. Les Bleus also had other outstanding attacking talents, but still focused on stability, and always direct the team to the right score. The only knockout match they won by more than one goal in these two tournaments was the 1998 world final, when they beat Brazil 3-0.

This is also the strategy of coach Walid Regragui when combining the defense with bright attacking stars. Players like Hakim Ziyech and Sofiane Boufal were the first to defend when the team chose to play this way. But that doesn't mean the duo's offensive ability is wasted. Morocco realized that Ziyech and Boufal's speed and direct kick could help them play on the counter-attack. They have the ability to dribble and independently fight to help the whole team bring the ball to the opponent's court as quickly as possible without much passing. At the 2022 World Cup, only France and Brazil played more directly than Morocco. And today two of these three teams meet to determine the final ticket to the final.

"Few people believed Morocco would make it to the semi-finals, but they did," said Deschamps. "The only difference is that to me, they are no longer a surprise."