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- Morocco 1-1 Norway: Odegaard nets equaliser in final World Cup warm-up
Morocco 1-1 Norway: Odegaard nets equaliser in final World Cup warm-up
Norway and Morocco will begin their World Cup campaigns on the back of a draw after Martin Odegaard cancelled out Brahim Diaz's early goal.
Morocco and Norway could not be separated in their final match before their respective World Cup campaigns begin after playing out a 1-1 draw at Sports Illustrated Stadium.
Brahim Diaz had given Morocco an eighth-minute lead, but Norway captain Martin Odegaard levelled things up 15 minutes from time to see the spoils shared on Sunday.
Mohamed Ouahbi's side will now turn their attentions to opening first Group C clash with Brazil on June 13, while Norway face Iraq in their first match at the World Cup since 1998.
The deadlock was broken inside the first 10 minutes by Diaz, who picked out the bottom-left corner following Abde Ezzalzouli's lung-busting run down the right-hand side.
But after assisting Diaz, Ezzalzouli was forced off with an injury at half-time, while Manchester United's Noussair Mazraoui also picked up a knock in the 29th minute of the match.
Morocco did, however, look the more likely to score as Diaz saw his shot repelled by Nyland, but they were made to pay for their profligacy by Odegaard's clever equaliser.
Just three minutes after coming on, substitute Oscar Bobb raced to the byline before cutting the ball back to Odegaard, who swept home at Yassine Bounou's near post.
Elsewhere, Croatia needed a stoppage-time winner from Mario Pasalic to beat Slovenia 2-1 at Stadion Andelko Herjavec in their final match before jetting off to North America.
Luka Modric's placed finish from the edge of the box in the 51st minute looked to have been enough to earn the win for Croatia until Andraz Sporar's 83rd-minute leveller.
However, Pasalic popped up with the decisive goal late on with a thunderous strike off the crossbar as Croatia signed off with a win before they face England on June 17.
Haaland struggles as Morocco left to wait on Ezzalzouli
No player scored more goals than Erling Haaland (16) during qualifying for the World Cup, but the Manchester City striker failed to make an impact for Norway and was restricted to just one shot worth an expected goals (xG) value of just 0.06.
Should Norway want to be successful on their World Cup return, they will need to find a way of getting the best out of Haaland, and that could be through Julian Ryerson, who once again produced another fine attacking display at full-back.
Since the start of 2025, Ryerson has created more chances (34) than any other Norway player, with four of those coming here. The Borussia Dortmund defender also finished with team-high totals for touches (70), crosses (13) and duels won (seven).
In what was just the second meeting between the two sides after a 2-2 draw in the group stage of the World Cup in 1998, Morocco will feel they did enough to get the victory.
They finished with an xG total of 1.14 from their 13 shots, five of which came from Ezzalzouli, compared to Norway's 0.8 from their nine attempts. Ezzalzouli also had more touches in the opposition box (four) and created more chances (two) than any other player for Morocco, who will be hoping his injury is nothing serious.












