The World Cup dream for England is over after their loss to France on Saturday.
Four teams, however, Argentina, Croatia, France, and Morocco, are still in Qatar and are each still hoping to win the championship in a week.
Few could have predicted the semi-final lineup, but it has a lot of intriguing storylines that could develop over the next few days.
The most prominent semi-final subplot centers on Lionel Messi and his potential to become Argentina’s first World Cup champion.
Morocco has already made history. They are the first African team and the first Arab team to advance to a World Cup semifinal.
Read more: World Cup quarterfinals: Teams, predictions, schedule, and more
But another of Europe’s best sides, France, stands in Morocco’s way.
Les Bleus are attempting to achieve something no one has done since Brazil 60 years ago in 1962: successfully defend the men’s World Cup.
In fact, the holders have struggled in recent years. Over the last 12 years, Italy, Spain, and Germany have all exited early as reigning champions, but France has broken that curse.
After defeating England on Saturday, they advanced to the semifinals for the first time since Brazil in 1998.
Croatia is back in the last four after another incredible show of resilience.
Argentina, who fell to Croatia in the World Cup group stage by a score of 3-0, will be wary of underestimating them.
How to follow the semi-finals?
Argentina v Croatia
The match will be aired Tuesday at 19:00 GMT.
The semi-final clash between Croatia and Argentina will take place at the Lusail Stadium in Lusail, Qatar.
Lusail, the largest of all the venues, will host the final. It has a seating capacity of 80,000.
After the tournament, the Lusail Stadium will be transformed into a community space with schools, shops, sporting facilities, and health clinics.
France v Morocco
France and Morocco face off at the Al Bayt Stadium which has a capacity of roughly 60,000 seats. The game will kick off at 19:00 GMT on Wednesday.
FIFA World Cup driving mobile advertisement spending
The ongoing FIFA World Cup in Qatar drove mobile advertisement spending in 2022, according to a study conducted by market intelligence firm data.ai.
In November, S&P Global Market Intelligence in its report noted that total digital advertisement spending globally could hit $534 billion in the 2022-2023 period, primarily driven by the major sporting event.
FIFA World Cup will help global spending on mobile advertising to reach $362 billion in 2023 as consumers worldwide are expected to spend trillions of hours on their Android and Apple devices, noted the data.ai report, formally known as App Annie.
Through the quarterfinals round of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, an estimated $213.6 million in national TV advertising was placed on the Fox TV networks and NBCUniversal’s Telemundo channels so far, according to iSpot.tv.
The tournament is expected to deliver record revenue for FIFA, topping the roughly $5.4 billion the 2018 World Cup in Russia generated, Bloomberg reported in November.
