Morocco coach, Walid Regragui, has said the third-place game against Croatia this afternoon will be mentally hard for his players, but declares his intentions to win while resting his key players.
“This third-place game will be hard for us, especially mentally. We have a lot of injuries and we are exhausted after our last match,” he said.
In addition, he blamed his side’s 2-0 loss to France in the second semi-final of the 2022 FIFA World Cup to unforced errors from his players.
Speaking in a post-match conference, Regragui regretted the early goal conceded as well as his decision to use a three-man defence line.
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“Actually, if I had any regrets about this game, they would be more about the beginning of the game. We conceded a goal very quickly, which gave more confidence to the French team to continue with their strategy.
“We said if we could get the ball, we would take it. We made too many technical errors at this level. Regardless, we were giving them issues in the first half. In the second half, we were more clever. We lost the ball less, we created so many dangerous situations, but we lacked decisiveness in the last 30 meters, unfortunately.
“We wanted to score early to create some doubt, however, with a team like that and with the talent they have offensively, we knew we could be punished at any moment. That is what happened for the second goal that kind of extinguished our hope.
“I thought having three centre-backs was a good idea as they would have less ground to cover. Sometimes, you have to take risks. We spent two days working on this formation, we were pretty well-organised but we made a lot of unforced errors,” he said.
