If there was ever a time to root for everybody Black, or more specifically African, it was this year’s FIFA World Cup. If that was your default fan posture, the soccer gods came through.
FIFA’s controversial expansion of the tournament meant that more teams from the continent qualified for the group round of play than ever. Not every African team’s coach thought expansion was a good idea; teams like Egypt, Morocco, Cabo Verde and expansion critic Carlos Queiroz’s Ghana squad disproved the idea that more teams cheapened the competition. Instead, the diaspora made good with multiple teams making it into the knockout rounds and even giving tournament favorites like Argentina (more on them later) the scare of their lives.
Unfortunately, Africa’s best-ever World Cup ended with Morocco’s quarterfinal loss, but just because there are no more teams from the motherland still vying for the title doesn’t mean settling for a terrible consolation prize. In fact, when the first semifinal game between France and Spain kicks off at 3 p.m on Tuesday, it may not be the game many of us hoped for, but it could turn out to be exactly the game we need.
Consider this: two of the biggest stars left in the final four are players of African descent who will meet on the pitch on Tuesday. Spain’s Lamine Yamal was born just outside Barcelona, but his parents come from Morocco and Equatorial Guinea.
When EBONY previewed our World Cup players to watch earlier this month, we told you that at only 18, Yamal came into the World Cup already a bona fide star of European football, with three Spanish national titles and a European championship already under his belt, plus two Spanish national player of the season honors. In the World Cup, he scored a goal on Spain’s way to an easy win over Saudi Arabia and was named Player of the Match in their quarterfinal win over Belgium, where he put up a clinic in keeping the pitch spaced enough to allow his teammates to attack.
If that wasn’t enough, he stood up to his own country’s fans after they taunted the Egyptian national team with racist and Islamophobic chants. Yamal’s not only good, he’s solid.
He’ll be across the pitch from Kylian Mbappé, who might be the biggest star of African descent in international soccer. Like Yamal, Mbappe was born in a major European city (Paris) to parents from Africa (Cameroon for his father, Algeria for his mother). Mbappé has put up an astonishing eight goals in this year’s World Cup, bringing his career total to 20 and matching his 2022 Golden Boot performance.
If you’re still not sold, there’s more star power to go around: Two more players from our original World Cup list of eight are in this match: Spain’s Nico Williams and France’s Bradley Barcola, who has two goals in the tournament, will also be part of the action.
On paper, the matchup looks like a thriller, but the real juice might be in what comes after. The second semifinal game pits England against Argentina. The latter squad entered the tournament as a heavy betting favorite but is also considered a villain by many fans after Argentina’s heartbreaking elimination of Cabo Verde and because of viral videos of Argentinian fans singing a racist song about Mbappé and other French players.
The only thing we’d love to see more than Mbappé or Yamal getting the chance to silence Argentina on the pitch in the World Cup final is how hard they’ll play each other for the chance to be the one who does it.
We can’t wait.