Mohamed Wahbi used Tuesday evening’s friendly between Morocco and Madagascar at Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium in Rabat as a live examination of his squad’s technical and physical readiness ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
The Morocco vs Madagascar match is being searched now because it was Morocco’s final home rehearsal before the team departs for the United States and a last warm-up against Norway on June 7, a schedule that leaves Wahbi one full away game to finalise his World Cup plan and the starting choices for the June 13 opener against Brazil.
The fixture carried obvious weight for Wahbi: Morocco have won four of their last five matches and arrived off a 5-0 victory over Burundi in their previous outing, with Ayoub El Kaabi and Soufiane Benjdida scoring two goals apiece and Tawfik Bentayeb also on the scoresheet. Those results underpin why the coaching staff treated this friendly as more than a runout — it was a final opportunity to confirm combinations and match fitness before travelling.
Madagascar arrived with a very different calendar. Their campaign for global qualification had already ended — they finished as runners-up in CAF World Cup qualifying Group I but were eliminated because they did not finish among the continent’s best runners-up — and their recent form included a 5-2 win over Kyrgyzstan and a 1-1 draw with Equatorial Guinea. Ranked 104th in the world, they used Rabat as a development exercise rather than a competitive checkpoint.
The gap between those objectives was the match’s central friction. Wahbi treated the evening like a high-stakes rehearsal for a World Cup side drawn in Group C with Brazil, Scotland and Haiti and scheduled to open against Brazil on June 13; Madagascar treated it as a low-stakes test of personnel. That mismatch complicates how the coaching staff’s conclusions should be read: sharp performances and fitness gains for Morocco may come against an opponent without the same pressure or tactical urgency they will face in Group C.
The history between the teams underlines why Wahbi was attentive. The sides have met twice in the African Nations Championship era: Madagascar beat Morocco 3-0 in the 2023 group stage, and Morocco returned the favour with a 3-2 victory in the 2025 final. Those recent results make even a friendly a useful barometer for tactical adjustments, but the context — friendly versus competitive histories — tempers what the coaching team can claim about readiness.
What happens next is straightforward and decisive: Morocco will travel to the United States for one final friendly, against Norway on June 7, described by the staff as the last rehearsal before the World Cup campaign begins. That match, not the Rabat friendly, will be the clearest indicator of starting XI choices and tactical plans for the June 13 opener with Brazil. For Wahbi, the unresolved question left by the Morocco vs Madagascar game is which performances he will trust when the stakes are the World Cup itself — and Norway in a week is his last chance to convert observation into selection.
