World Cup 3rd place game: How to bet Croatia vs. Morocco

The third-place match at the World Cup is the most important irrelevant game on the sporting calendar.

Both teams in this match, Croatia and Morocco, will be devastated to not be playing for the Jules Rimet Trophy on Sunday, but finishing on the podium at the biggest tournament in the world is a fantastic achievement for any nation, especially a non-traditional soccer power like these two countries.

From a betting standpoint, most casual punters will likely skip this tilt and just focus on the final, but the money you win on the bronze medal match is just as green as the cash you get from winning a bet on the final.

There are some unique circumstances in betting when motivation and the stakes of a game have to be considered and this is one of them. On one side of this match stands Croatia, the runners up in 2018 who were just one win away from getting back to a second consecutive final. Just getting this far is an astounding accomplishment for a country of just four million people.

But it’s likely that the Croatian National Team won’t look at it that way. The core of this team, which is headlined by generational talent Luka Modrić, knows this was their last shot at doing something special and will be bitterly disappointed to be playing in a third-place match four years after playing in a final. The Croatians have some young standouts in their roster, but generally they’re an older team that has played a ton of soccer over the last month.

It wouldn’t be a surprise if they’re not firing on all cylinders on Saturday.

As for Morocco, this a huge match. No African or Arab country has ever made it to the semifinals of a World Cup, so while the Atlas Lions will be shattered not to be in the final, this is still a monumental match for a country that entered the tournament as a triple-digit longshot.

And motivation aside, Morocco has simply been a better team in this tournament compared to Croatia.

Prior to their 2-0 loss to France in the semifinals, Morocco had conceded just one goal (and it was an own goal) throughout the entire tournament and held Croatia, Belgium, Spain and Portugal to a total of 3.4 expected goals. That’s wildly impressive.

As for Croatia, they were the ultimate bend-but-don’t-break team in the tournament. The Checkered Ones needed penalties to get by Japan and upset Brazil, but it was not surprising to see them finally get overrun by Argentina.

Motivation will play a big part in this match, but even on form it’s hard not to see Morocco as the value side on Saturday.

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