PARIS: A brilliant brace by Barcelona’s Fermin Lopez helped fire Spain to a 3-0 win over Japan and a place in the semi-finals of the Olympic men’s football on Friday, after a dominant Morocco outclassed the United States.

Lopez, a member of Spain’s triumphant Euro squad, blasted in the opener with a left-foot strike from range in the 11th minute of the quarter against Japan in Lyon.

The 21-year-old struck again on 73 minutes with another goal of the highest quality as he controlled a Sergio Gomez corner before volleying in from the edge of the box, this time with his right foot.

Abel Ruiz wrapped up the win late on after the Japanese failed to clear another Gomez corner.

Olympic champions in 1992 and silver medallists three years ago in Tokyo, Spain will now go to Marseille for a semi-final on Monday against Morocco, who were impressive 4-0 winners against the USA in Paris.

Morocco had the vast majority of a noisy and packed crowd at the Parc des Princes behind them and were simply too strong for their opponents.

Soufiane Rahimi opened the scoring from the penalty spot before Ilias Akhomach and captain Achraf Hakimi added further goals in the second half, with another spot-kick, by Mehdi Maouhoub, wrapping up the win.

After topping their group ahead of Argentina, Morocco are looking like serious contenders to win gold in Paris on August 9.

The Moroccan community has turned out in big numbers over the last week to back their team, who came to the Games after winning last year’s U-23 AFCON.

Medals table

(Tabulated under country, gold, silver, bronze and total)

China 13 7 7 27

USA 9 17 15 41

France 9 11 11 31

Great Britain 9 8 8 25

Australia 8 6 5 19

Japan 8 3 6 17

South Korea 7 5 4 16

Italy 5 8 4 17

Netherlands 4 2 2 8

Canada 3 2 5 10

Germany 2 3 2 7

New Zealand 2 3 1 6

Romania 2 3 1 6

Hong Kong 2 0 2 4

Ireland 2 0 2 4

Hungary 1 2 1 4

Georgia 1 2 0 3

Spain 1 1 3 5

Switzerland 1 1 3 5

South Africa 1 1 2 4

Belgium 1 0 2 3

Kazakhstan 1 0 2 3

Uzbekistan 1 0 2 3

Guatemala 1 0 1 2

Argentina 1 0 0 1

Ecuador 1 0 0 1

Poland 0 1 3 4

Kosovo 0 1 1 2

Turkey 0 1 1 2

Ukraine 0 1 1 2

Fiji 0 1 0 1

Mongolia 0 1 0 1

Tunisia 0 1 0 1

India 0 0 3 3

Moldova 0 0 2 2

Tajikistan 0 0 2 2

Austria 0 0 1 1

Egypt 0 0 1 1

Portugal 0 0 1 1

Slovakia 0 0 1 1

Updated to 11:10pm (PST)

Published in Dawn, August 3rd, 2024