Olympic Soccer Showdown: Morocco vs Spain Preview and Best Bets

SportsGrid

Watch Olympic Soccer Showdown: Morocco vs Spain Preview and Best Bets - SportsGrid on Dailymotion

Transcript

00:00We're getting ready for the gold medal at the Olympics for soccer, and now we're getting

00:08really toward the end of the line to find out who's going to get there, and we need

00:11some help doing it.

00:12So Michael DiCorsi joins us courtesy of Sporting News to break it all down.

00:16Mike, we've got some matches coming up.

00:18In fact, there's one straight ahead of us here at noon Eastern, so I don't want to waste

00:23much time saying hi and giving you a high five.

00:25Let's get right to it.

00:26Morocco takes on Spain.

00:28It's supposed to be a very highly contested match, I would assume today, based on the

00:33odds.

00:34So let's take a look at those.

00:35Morocco is plus 240, so they are the dog.

00:38Spain is the favorite.

00:39They're plus 110, but as you can see there, a tie is plus 240 as well.

00:43So naturally, this could go any of three directions, at least from looking at the odds.

00:48That's my interpretation of it.

00:49How about yours?

00:50Yeah.

00:52The challenge in evaluating Olympic soccer is that these teams are really not together

00:58for very long.

01:00They might have a few friendlies on the way in, and in the case of Spain, for instance,

01:05a couple of their players wouldn't have been available for those exhibitions because they

01:12were on the Euro 2024 squad that they didn't get a lot of playing time, but they were on

01:18the Euro squad that won the championship, Lopez and Baena.

01:22And so we don't really know, even after, what, three, four games, exactly how great these

01:28teams are.

01:29I think if you went on impression and watching them play, you'd feel pretty strong about

01:35Morocco.

01:36Morocco has been fabulous at taking out Argentina back in the contested opener that became so

01:43controversial and then the obliteration of the United States for nothing in the quarterfinals.

01:49You'd be really excited about it.

01:50That plus the fact that they probably have the most accomplished player in the tournament

01:55in Ashraf Hakimi.

01:57You could say Alexander Lacazette from France, but maybe the most accomplished younger player.

02:03Hakimi is an overage player in this competition.

02:06Everybody's supposed to be 23 or younger, except for three players.

02:11Lacazette is toward the end of his career.

02:14Hakimi is in the prime of his, and he's a fabulous right back.

02:17And he was phenomenal against the United States on Friday.

02:21So for me, I feel like a little bit of the upset here is in order.

02:27Spain has the brand recognition, but Morocco has a really tightly orchestrated team.

02:34They were so well coached against the United States.

02:37Their moves were beautiful.

02:39Hakimi is as good as there is at his position.

02:42I like what I see from them, but again, it's a tough thing to grade teams that have only

02:50really been together for four or five games.

02:53Yeah, and I think that's fair because again, it's, and again, you look at the odds.

02:58I mean, I think FanDuel has it appropriately priced because of that.

03:00As you mentioned, a lot of the players younger in age than you would normally see when the

03:05countries would be playing against each other in a tournament.

03:08Let's take a look real quick at any time goal score.

03:10You illustrated a couple of names there.

03:12I was wondering if you like any others.

03:14Sergio Camelo is the favorite to score a goal today at plus 200.

03:19Abel Ruiz at plus 210.

03:21And then pretty much, as you can see, Mike, not a ton of value there, like plus 230s,

03:27plus 300s for an anytime goal score.

03:29I mean, usually this is fours, fives.

03:32What am I reading into here by seeing that?

03:35Yeah, I think some of it is that they, that it's such a, it's such a, I hate to use this

03:42term in this phrase, but it's a crapshoot.

03:45You know, you don't want to hit a gambling issue with a gambling cliche, but it kind

03:50of is because it's really hard to gauge who is going to score.

03:55Again, it's not just these, this is a youth competition.

03:58If you were looking at the U-20 World Cup, say, United States just qualified for the

04:04next one with their victory over the weekend and then fell in the championship of the CONCACAF.

04:13Those teams are together.

04:15They play in the qualifying.

04:16They play in advance of the tournament, and then they're in the tournament.

04:19The Olympics is basically put together.

04:21OK, here you go.

04:23You're on the plane to Paris.

04:24And that's really tough to judge.

04:26And that's why it's really hard to know who would get a goal out of this.

04:30I would, I would say that this would be a bad bet for anyone to take.

04:34If you have conviction, do it.

04:36But it's just, there's just no, there's no price value in any of that.

04:40No, a lot of two to ones in a soccer match.

04:43You just don't see that a lot.

04:44And I think that you're probably right.

04:46If you can't price it, don't give anybody great odds.

04:49And I think that's what Spandau is doing.

04:51OK, a little bit of a different story here.

04:53So, Mike, we got the semifinals on the other side.

04:56We got France and Egypt.

04:57I mean, most expect France to dominate and win this one.

05:00Their heavy favorite here at minus 310.

05:02Even a tie is four to one.

05:04Egypt, not expected to be at this stage.

05:06One of the big surprises probably, I would say, on the men's side, plus 750.

05:11Anything to surprise us today?

05:12Any shot here that Egypt comes away with one of the bigger Olympic upsets we've seen?

05:18Yeah, I mean, you're exactly right, Craig.

05:20If, I mean, we've seen upsets at this tournament, excuse me, at this,

05:23these Olympics, I should say, in various sports.

05:26But I would say that if Egypt were to beat France,

05:29even though, as I mentioned before, these are not together teams,

05:33Egypt beating France on France's home soil with Lacazette out there,

05:37et cetera, would be among the bigger upsets of these games.

05:40I'm not going to go into history and all of that.

05:43I'm not sure whether we could go, like I say,

05:45it's as big as Russia beating the Olympic men's,

05:48U.S. men's basketball team at 72 or something like that.

05:51But it would be an enormous upset.

05:55Again, because they're so, it's such a high reward

05:58and all they have to do is nick a goal and stay clean on the defensive side,

06:04you might be able to get a big reward for what is just basically a victory.

06:09But I would say that it would be a stunner if they were able to pull it off.

06:13All right.

06:14And finally, let's hit the three on threes.

06:16Team USA went out with a whimper, to say the least.

06:19Netherlands against Lithuania today at noon.

06:22So that's coming up in about 40 minutes from now.

06:25And right now I see Netherlands as a slight favorite, minus one and a half.

06:30And then we have Latvia taking on France.

06:33And that game will be played later as well.

06:35Latvia actually favored in this one, despite France having the home crowd there.

06:41Again, Mike, I watch a little bit of this.

06:43I know that they're trying to incorporate new sports, new ideas into the Olympics.

06:47I think they've done a good job of it.

06:49How would you define this sport specifically in the Olympics?

06:53And who do you think comes out?

06:55Well, my friend, Fran Priscilla, who is involved with the U.S. effort,

06:59but didn't get enough input, in my opinion, into who should be on the team.

07:03I would say that he compared it to beach volleyball.

07:08And I thought that was a perfect descriptor.

07:10Look for Latvia.

07:12All right.

07:12Latvia, says Mike DiCorsi.

07:14Mike, see you soon.

07:14Thanks again.

Category

Transcript

Recommended