New Grievances and Old Scores Settled! Olympic Men’s Football: Spain Eliminates Morocco; Players Post Memes to Satirize Achraf Hakimi

In the semi-final match between Morocco and Spain at the Olympic Games, a controversy surrounding Achraf Hakimi continued after the game. Some players from Spain’s U23 team mocked the Moroccan full-back.

While it is said that enemies should reconcile rather than continue feuding, the young Spanish players seemingly do not share this sentiment. In the semi-finals, they staged a comeback victory against Morocco, dashing the latter’s hopes for the gold medal. Following this, they took aim at Achraf Hakimi.

This feud traces back to the World Cup in Qatar, where Achraf Hakimi performed his signature “penguin dance” after eliminating the Spanish team. Making matters worse, during the Olympic semi-final, after Morocco was awarded a penalty, Hakimi got into a verbal altercation with Tena. This led to Morocco taking a 1-0 lead from the penalty kick.

A video shows that Achraf Hakimi made some provocative remarks to Tena. Therefore, after Spain won 2-1, the players of Spain’s U23 team launched their counterattack on social media. Diego Lopez was the first to act, posting an emoji of a penguin with an indifferent expression, accompanied by the text: “We’re in the final, but we want the gold. That’s Spain.”

Just ten minutes later, Samu Omoorodion joined in, posting several penguin emojis and some smiling faces without any accompanying text. The dispute is escalating, and clearly, despite being born in Spain, Hakimi’s relationship with Spanish football has reached a freezing point.

However, this was also followed by racist comments from some Moroccan fans targeting Spanish player Samu on social media. These abusive remarks flooded the internet, drawing criticism from the media.