Cody Gakpo struck in the seventy second minute and the Netherlands looked safe, in control, eighteen minutes from the Round of 16. Then they did the most Dutch thing imaginable: they sat back, invited pressure, and let Issa Diop rise up in the ninety first minute to head Morocco level and rip the game away from them at the death.

Extra time solved nothing, so it went to the place where Dutch dreams have so often gone to die: the penalty shootout. And waiting there was Yassine Bounou, Morocco's serial heartbreaker, who saved from Crysencio Summerville before Ismael Saibari calmly buried the decisive kick to send Morocco through 3-2 on spot kicks.

Morocco march into the Round of 16 to face Canada, carrying that same giant killing magic that lit up their last World Cup run. The Netherlands march home, undone not by a better team over ninety minutes but by their own caution and their own nerves, a side good enough to lead and not brave enough to finish.