France Cruise Into World Cup Semi-Finals With 2-0 Win
Get the Sports newsletter
Daily sports — scores, transfers, the storylines from the leagues you actually follow. Free.
- France beat Morocco 2-0 in Boston, becoming the first team into the 2026 World Cup semi-finals after Mbappe and Dembele scored within six minutes early in the second half.
- Kylian Mbappe has 8 tournament goals — level with Argentina's Lionel Messi at the top of the scoring charts but leading the Golden Boot race on assists — while Ousmane Dembele has 5, making France the first team since Brazil in 2002 to have two players score 5+ goals at a single World Cup.
- France have scored 16 goals in the tournament, more than any other side, and conceded only 2 in six games — both late goals against Senegal and Norway — while registering 22 attempts against Morocco to their opponents' 5 (with Morocco's lone shot on target arriving in the 83rd minute).
- Didier Deschamps, in his final tournament as manager after 14 years in charge, has already won the 2018 World Cup and lost the 2022 final with France; former midfielder Patrick Vieira told ITV Sport the current squad is "maybe one of the best" ever assembled.
- If Spain beat Belgium in Friday's quarter-final, they will face France in the semi-final in Dallas on Tuesday; Vieira said France are "a better team today than they were four years ago" but warned Spain have not improved similarly.
- Roy Keane said on ITV that France "have got more gears to go" and any team trying to beat them "have got to score the first goal," while Ian Wright called them "one of the most clear favourites for a World Cup tournament I have ever seen."
Why it matters: With 16 goals scored (more than any other team) and only 2 conceded across six games, France are two wins from a third World Cup title — and Patrick Vieira, Roy Keane, and Ian Wright all labelled them the tournament's best side, though Keane warned they could still be beaten by a team that scores first.
