Morocco's secret weapon

Behind Morocco's stunning rise in world football lies an unlikely financial engine: phosphate. 

The Atlas Lions' march through the 2026 World Cup, where they face Canada in Houston on Saturday before a quarter-final clash against France on July 9, is backed in part by OCP Group, the world's largest phosphate fertiliser producer, which joined a National Football Training Fund in 2024 alongside the Royal Moroccan Football Federation and private investors.

The logic is straightforward. Morocco sits atop the world's largest phosphate reserves, a finite, irreplaceable mineral that global agriculture depends on. 

While China restricts exports, Russia is geopolitically unreliable and US production faces an uncertain future, Morocco has emerged as the stable, reliable supplier of choice. 

The Trump administration recently lifted some restrictions on Moroccan phosphate imports to ease shortages created by the Iran war, a sign of just how strategically important Morocco's reserves have become.

OCP's football investment funds training academies with modern infrastructure, advanced technical expertise and a FIFA partnership.

But this is not where Morocco's football ambitions began. Back in 2009, King Mohammed VI directed the government to invest in football infrastructure, pitches, youth academies, stadiums and professional coaching. OCP joined fifteen years later to take the project to another level.

The results speak for themselves. A semi-final at the 2022 World Cup, the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations title, and now another deep run in 2026.

Morocco knocked out Spain and Portugal in Qatar. A potential quarter-final against France on July 9 would be the most charged match of the tournament.

Sometimes a country's greatest natural resource funds its greatest sporting dreams.