Facing Spain, Morocco coach Walid Regragui is not short of enthusiasm – Liberation

At the head of the Moroccan selection, which meets this afternoon the Spanish national team in Al-Rayyan, Qatar, the coach hopes to lead the Atlas Lions for the first time in the quarter-finals of the World Cup.

Player, already, Walid Regragui did nothing like the others. The future coach of Morocco, 47, has long preferred games in the city of Montconseil, in Corbeil-Essonnes (Essonne), to the club of his city. «Street football gives you intuition, the beautiful gesture and the dribbling. I must have done 3,000 tournaments in four years… We were testing ourselves. At first, we bet on Coke and cakes, then, as we grew up, on knitwear. Each gave 30 balls and the winning team went to buy pizzas,” he said to Release in 2005. Until one day in the mid-1990s when the first-team coach, who was just starting out in his career, suddenly turned up. “By chance, I went to see the juniors 3, and I saw this slender, fast, skilful player, with temperamentrecalls Rudi Garcia, future coach of Roma and OM. I wondered what he was doing there. I took him with the seniors and he never left the team. He did two seasons with us and he left to fly on his own. In seven years, Regragui went from one division to another, from the anonymity of the CFA 2, the fifth French level, and from the bars of Montconseil, to the Spanish Liga, in Santander, after stints in Toulouse and Ajaccio. . His worker father dreamed that he would work in an office, he would obtain a Deug in economics and social sciences before scratching 45 caps with the Atlas Lions.

“He knows how to manage egos”

On a bench, his career will have similarly taken side roads. Last August, ten years after starting as assistant to the national team, Walid succeeded Vahid (Halilhodzic), fired like a mess after qualifying. Obvious in the country. “There was a consensus around his name. As a coach, he won titles everywhere at FUS Rabat [entre 2014 et 2020] like at Wydad Casablanca [2021-22] where he even took the African Champions League [en juin dernier]. His appointment also allowed the return to favor of Mazraoui, who plays for Bayern Munich, and Ziyech, at Chelsea, two of our best players, who were dismissed by Halilhodzic. Walid has charisma, he knows how to manage egos“, promises Hicham Dmii, the mahout of Moroccan Hopes.

Ten years after having stealthily started as assistant to Rachid Taoussi at the head of the Atlas Lions, the native of Corbeil returns to finish the job on the biggest competition there is, the World Cup. “In Ajaccio, Walid was already showing his interest in all aspects of the job: tactics, talks, managing men… He is thirsty for knowledge and knows the springs in his men’s heads. In Qatar, clearly, it boosts them”, thinks he knows Rolland Courbis, his former coach. This afternoon against Spain, Morocco will play to surpass the best performance of the Maghreb selection (a round of 16 in 1986) and equal the best course of an African team at a World Cup (quarter-final for Cameroon, Senegal and Ghana). Coming out of a group that included Croatia, vice-world champion in 2018, and Belgium, third in the last tournament, the Moroccans are no longer afraid of anything. “Walid works hard and his journey has taught him not to set limits. As a result, his men are prepared for the feat.

Like at home in Qatar

During this World Cup in Qatar, all African teams fielded a coach from the continent, a first in history. Regragui placed himself from the outset in a double perspective, Arabophile and continental. “We, at the start, without playing politics, we are already going to talk about football and we are defending Morocco and Moroccans. Then, of course, we are also Africans and we hope to show that our football has passed a stage. We have often been decried in the past. On this World Cup, any African team has competed with teams from other confederations. he said at a press conference.

In the gas emirate, the Moroccan coach is at home. In 2020, he came to freelance for a season at Al-Duhail to win the national title. “Football is universal, you can’t only play in Europe, he continued to address the world. You have to go to areas to be cleared. For an Arab kid, having a country like Qatar that organizes, it values ​​you, it can create hope. The enthusiasm in Morocco is very strong, and in the Maghreb countries, this necessarily makes you want to organize the World Cup one day. His roadmap should lead him to CAN 2024 in Côte d’Ivoire. After that, he could well come to a big European club, another way of performance. “He speaks English and Spanish and he has all the required skills”, assured Rudi Garcia.