Morocco’s Soccer Revolution: Inside the Mohammed VI Academy’s Rise to Global Prominence

Larguet is one of the architects of the creation of the Mohammed VI Academy. "Thanks to His Majesty the King, I had the chance to create the academy from scratch. I was responsible for recruiting the technical, logistical and administrative staff and especially the players throughout Morocco. The goal was to be a model, because the country in the past has been a training ground and unfortunately the training has been neglected for a while. Many players in the U23 teams and in the lower categories come from the Mohammed VI Academy and I hope that in the future the number will increase with the A team," he confided in an interview with Onze Mondial.

With their historic run at the World Cup, the Atlas Lions are highly anticipated at the 2024 CAN in Ivory Coast, analyzes the former DTN of Morocco. "There is a lot of pressure (laughs...). The coach said, not being in the semi-finals would be a failure. Morocco is on top of Arab and African football, the country has shown that it can compete with the biggest nations in this sport. Africa will be waiting for Morocco, all the teams will want to beat the Atlas Lions. The team is young and ambitious, they have the qualities necessary to go all the way," he says.

Larguet also addresses the case of Azzedine Ounahi, a young prodigy from the Mohammed VI Academy who plays for Olympique de Marseille (OM). "Ounahi was part of the annex of the academy in Casablanca, he was a boy who was steeped in individual qualities. A real street player, very skilled technically and capable of easily eliminating. For his young age, he had a big personality... For me, Azzedine Ounahi is a great midfielder with a very good ability to find the last pass and eliminate when the game is blocked. He has such an intelligence of the game that even in ball recovery, he is very useful," he details.

According to him, the young player can impose himself at OM under the new coach Marcelino. "It all depends on Marcelino’s way of working and the player himself. If ever Azzedine Ounahi is not in the starting lineup, he must not lose patience. He is still very young, he has already shown that he was a world-class player during the World Cup. He is largely capable of reproducing his huge past performances at OM," supports Larguet. And to insist: "The young people who come [to the OM center] must be aware that it is for excellence, they must have a big personality to hope to impose themselves".