World Cup LIVE: Croatia vs Morocco third-place play-off team news and line-ups as Luka Modric starts plus Argentina vs France build-up

Croatia and Morocco made several changes to their starting lineups for their World Cup third-place playoff at Khalifa International Stadium on Saturday, with both coaches giving opportunities to players benched during the tournament.

Morocco will be without skipper Romain Saiss who lasted only 21 minutes in the semi-final defeat by France before he was substituted, with head coach Walid Regragui saying it was a risk worth taking at the time but not for the playoff.

“We won’t be taking risks… especially Saiss. He’s been ruled out. But I’m confident and trust in our group,” Regragui had said on the eve of the game.

In defence, Achraf Hakimi and Jawad El Yamiq retain their place, with Achraf Dari and Yahya Attiat-Allah coming in for the injured Saiss and Nayef Aguerd.

Croatia skipper Luka Modric starts in midfield alongside Mateo Kovacic, but Marcelo Brozovic sits out with Lovro Majer coming in. Marko Livaja and Mislav Orsic start in attack.

Croatia XI: Livakovic; Stanisic, Sutalo, Gvardiol, Perisic; Modric, Kovacic, Majer; Orsic, Kramaric, Livaja

Morocco XI: Bono, Hakimi, Dari, El Yamiq, Attiat-Allah, Amrabat, El Khannouss, Ziyech, Sabiri, Boufal, En-Nesyri

Croatia are preparing for a “huge” match against Morocco in Saturday’s World Cup third-place playoff with the African team’s surprise run to the semi-finals reminiscent of Croatia’s own success at the 2018 tournament, coach Zlatko Dalic said

Morocco, punching above their weight, beat Belgium and Canada in the group stage before eliminating 2010 world champions Spain on penalties in the last 16 and then beating 2016 European champions Portugal in the quarter-finals.

Morocco’s dream run ended in the last four against France, who had beaten surprise finalists Croatia in the 2018 World Cup final, but they still became the first African and Arab country to reach a World Cup semi-final.

African football had suffered a crisis of confidence after the last World Cup in Russia, when none of the five teams made it out of the group phase, but that has now all changed with the performance of Walid Regraguis team in Qatar.

“Morocco resemble us from four years ago. No one expected them to reach this stage,” Dalic said. “They deserve to be here. They will be a more challenging opponent than in the first match.”

“They have grown in self-confidence and are motivated. For both it is a huge and major match.”

Morocco at last have their World Cup. The country that has spent so long trying to host the competition have probably gone one better and made themselves the story of this one.

It was a quite beautiful thing at Education City, that bore witness to a nation-making moment. That was what was most of all symbolised by the victorious Moroccan players bowing in front of their exuberant supporters, a moment of communion.

“When you have a heart, energy and love, you win matches,” mastermind head coach Walid Regragui said.

ut of the many facts and figures circulated about Qatar’s problems, there is one realisation that should stand above everything. It is a disgrace that, in 2022, a country can host a World Cup where it has lured millions of people from the poorest countries on earth – often under false pretences – and then forced them into what many call “modern slavery”.

And yet this has just been accepted. The World Cup carries on, an end product of a structure that is at once Orwellian and Kafkaesque. A huge underclass of people work in an autocratic surveillance state, amid an interconnected network of issues that make it almost impossible to escape. “It’s all so embedded,” says Michael Page of Human Rights Watch.

Argentina and France have emerged as finalists for the World Cup 2022 after some enthralling football.

There have been plenty of upsets in Qatar, while some of the world’s best have dazzled throughout the tournament.

From the best moments, the most outstanding player (no surprises here) and the verdict on England and Wales, who both shared disappointment.

Here Independent Sport breaks down the best and worst from Qatar:

In the Argentina camp, there’s an encouraging line they’ve now heard from Lionel Messi a lot through this World Cup, but that has some lament to it. The 35-year-old has been repeatedly saying how much he is enjoying this World Cup, before occasionally offering a wistful caveat.

“I would have liked to enjoy more of the games with the national team.”

Some of that sentiment is down to the “s***” he says the team suffered after the shock defeat to Saudi Arabia. Some of it is down to everything that came before, and the circus around a significant number of those 171 international appearances. There were the three lost finals between 2014 and 2016, with Messi admitting to friends he has woken up in the middle of the night thinking of the Maracana eight years ago, when Argentina lost to Germany in the World Cup final. There was all the pressure, even some bad feeling.

It is not often that a World Cup final comes around and a team playing in the North West Counties First Division South has a direct interest. Abbey Hey, based in Gorton in south east Manchester and not far at all from the Etihad Stadium, are awaiting the return of their two highest-profile players Rafael and Agustin Alvarez from international duty. Their younger brother Julian’s international duty, to be precise.

Just as Julian Alvarez’s family followed him to Manchester, they followed him to Qatar, and that meant the budding careers of his brothers in English football’s tenth tier had to be put on hold for however long Argentina remained at the tournament. At least Rafael and Agustin – or ‘Punchi’ and ‘Turron’, as they are known among the Alvarez family – have not missed much.

Liberte, Egalite, Dynastie? A particularly prominent Parisian believes so. “Over the past 20 years you can say France is the top footballing country in the world,” Walid Regragui said. “They have the best players and the best coaches and they are the best team in the world.”

As France approach their fourth final in the last seven World Cups, aiming to become the first team to retain the title since Brazil in 1962, perhaps football is coming home. The World Cup, after all, was created by a Frenchman, Jules Rimet. As Didier Deschamps bids to join Pele in the select band of the three-time winners, a second Frenchman has come to assume a similar importance in the competition. France’s success owes much to one man, captain in 1998, manager in 2018 and 2022, on the brink of history again.

Ahead of a fixture of such a scale that it can overcome most players, a figure as experienced as Didier Deschamps knows exactly what he needs to tell his squad. He’s been here before, after all, as a captain and then as the victorious manager in the last World Cup. Deschamps may have all the composure that comes with potentially being just the second coach in history to retain the trophy, but he is well aware that some players start to feel an anxious energy they can’t contain, with the knowledge that every individual could go down in history – for good or bad – infusing every moment.