football world cupYou will undoubtedly remember Yassine Bounou’s ‘disappearing trick’ just before Morocco’s World Cup match against the Red Devils. The goalkeeper disappeared after the national anthems, and after grabbing his head, suddenly disappeared from the field. In an interview with this newspaper, compatriot and teammate Bilal El Khannouss now explains what exactly was going on.
When Morocco’s line-up became known an hour before kick-off, there were few or no surprising names among them. There was also Sevilla goalkeeper Yassine Bounou – a very good goalkeeper and therefore a certitude. Second keeper Monir El Kajoui would start on the bench.
That’s how it seemed to happen, because Bounou stepped onto the field with his teammates to sing the Moroccan national anthem. But during the match, to everyone’s surprise, El Kajoui suddenly stood between the posts.
Images showed how Bounou grabbed his head during the national anthem and then went to national coach Walid Regragui to tell him that he would not be able to play after all. “Bounou received injections against the pain before matches,” says Genk player Bilal El Khannouss in an interview about his World Cup adventure with Morocco. “It was the reason why Bounou was not in goal against Belgium. He reacted badly to such an injection and suddenly had cloudy vision.”
The mystery finally unraveled. Bounou had no more problems in subsequent matches. The goalkeeper turned out to be a national hero by standing firm against Spain in the penalty shootout and also keeping his nets clean in the quarterfinals against Portugal.
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