Upa and Olise in quarters, Phonzy eliminated

The first two World Cup round of 16 matches took place on Saturday evening. Three Bayern players reached the quarter-finals, but one is now out of the tournament: France with Dayot Upamecano and Michael Olise defeated a tenacious Paraguay side 1–0 in a hard-fought match, while Ismael Saibari and Morocco won 3–0 against Alphonso Davies and co-hosts Canada, who were knocked out.

Paraguay, who had beaten Germany, put up a more vigorous fight than expected against the previously impressive French side. Les Bleus with Dayot Upamecano and Michael Olise had progressed to the last 16 with a comfortable 3–0 win over Sweden, but struggled for a long time to capitalise on their overwhelming dominance on Saturday night. Time and again, their attacks were repelled by the South Americans’ extremely physical defence – until Kilian Mbappé sealed his country’s place in the quarter-finals with a penalty (75) to make the final score 1–0.

In the last eight, the 2018 World Cup winners will face Morocco and their new Bayern signing Ismael Saibari on Thursday at 22:00 CEST. Morocco beat Canada 3–0 thanks to an improved second-half performance. However, FCB’s new Moroccan forward had to be substituted after 22 minutes due to injury. At the other end, Alphonso Davies did not feature at all for the co-hosts and was unable to prevent the Canadians’ elimination.