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The enigmatic life and complex legacy of Pinky Deras, America’s greatest Little Leaguer

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The enigmatic life and complex legacy of Pinky Deras, America’s greatest Little Leaguer

DETROIT — The cedar chest had been there his whole life. Down in the basement, near the water heater and next to the storage racks filled with all the knick-knacks a person accrues over seven-plus decades. Adam Deras knew the chest was full of Dad’s old stuff, but he had never seen it opened.

Now Art “Pinky” Deras was gone, so Adam and his much older brother, Kevin, cleaned out the house. They came to the old weathered chest. Soon the glorified wooden box was open, and Adam peered inside. He saw a few small trophies, some posters, a scrapbook and a few old signs. There was a brown paper bag, and inside, a red batting helmet from the ’50s or ’60s. Under the brim of the helmet, his father’s initials were inscribed: AD. Inside the crown, there was still a piece of hair.

Adam’s father was once a Little League superstar, widely considered the greatest ever. Deras made it to Double A in the St. Louis Cardinals system and then, beaten down and burned out, he walked away. For many years, he wanted nothing to do with baseball. People whispered about how he had thrown out most of the mementos from his career: bats and balls, photos and trophies.

“I’m sure what they said was true,” Adam says now, “because there was nothing really there.”

That fact may seem odd, but it would come as no surprise to anyone who knew him. Art was humble and reserved. Never talked about his younger days unless directly asked, and even then you’d be lucky to get more than a couple sentences in response.

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After his baseball career reached its premature end — he once told the Detroit Free Press he simply never showed up to Cardinals camp, and never heard from the team again — Art settled into a 29-year career with the police department in the Detroit suburb of Warren. At his funeral in 2022, the family made a display with photos from his Little League days, and mourners recounted his legendary statistics: 108 innings pitched and an astonishing 298 strikeouts, an 18-0 record with 16 shutouts and 10 no-hitters for a 1959 team that won the Little League World Series.

Longtime coworkers were stunned. “I partnered with your dad for almost 20 years,” one person told Kevin, “and I had no idea.”

His accomplishments fell out of focus over time, but the ghost of unmet potential always lurked in the background of Art’s life. In 1974, Art was only 27 years old when the Free Press ran a story with the headline: What ever happened to baseball phenom Pinky Deras?

In the article, Art mused about the pressures of pro ball and the weight of all the expectations he carried. Then he said this: “At least when my two-year-old son, Kevin, grows up I can tell him I played catch with Stan Musial.”

Fifty years later, at a sports bar in another Detroit suburb, Kevin is discussing his father’s life and legacy. He hears the question: Did your dad ever tell you about playing catch with Stan Musial?

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He laughs and says no.

Like with so many things, he wishes now he could go back and ask.


No one ever figured out exactly why he went by Pinky. They just knew his grandmother called him that one day, and for whatever reason, the nickname stuck.

What they did know was he was the greatest thing they had ever seen. At 12 years old, Deras was already nearing 6 feet tall, bigger and stronger than everyone on the field. He happened to be more talented, too.

“What I used to compare it to was facing Nolan Ryan from 48 feet, then having to pitch to Mickey Mantle,” said Tom Paciorek, a Detroit native who went on to play 18 seasons in the major leagues.

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Deras was a dominant force on the team representing the little Detroit enclave of Hamtramck. That team captured the heart of the area, and its title went down as one of the crowning moments in the community’s history. In the celebratory aftermath, Dodge paid for the tweens to travel across the country, where they appeared on the Lawrence Welk show in primetime.

Two years later, Deras was teammates with Paciorek, and the pair helped lead a Pony League team to another championship on the national stage. The city still commemorates the achievements with signage at its border. There is a street named Pinky Deras Way near the hallowed ground of Hamtramck Stadium. The sign’s subtext reads: “The greatest little leaguer there ever was.”

As the Little League World Series gets underway this week in Williamsport, Pa., and as Deras’ beloved Detroit Tigers prepare to play the New York Yankees Sunday in the MLB Little League Classic, the absurdity of Deras’s youth statistics come into greater focus. Deras is remembered the way he is because many of his records will never be broken, especially with today’s pitch-count restrictions for young players. On two occasions, he threw six-inning perfect games in which he struck out all 18 batters. They clocked him at 71 mph off the Little League mound, the equivalent of a 100 mph fastball from the major-league distance. At the plate, he hit .641 and smashed 33 home runs. He hit a grand slam in the Little League World Series semifinal, then threw a three-hitter in a 12-0 championship win against a team from West Auburn, Calif.

“I have the Little League playoffs on right now,” Paciorek said recently from his home in Georgia. “Unfortunately, there’s no Pinky Deras in there. If there was, you would know.”

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Deras’ dominance did not end with Pony ball. As the years went on, other kids grew and began to catch up to Deras’ physical profile. His growth plateaued at 6-foot-2. Most still did not come close to matching his talent.

As a senior at Hamtramck High School, he hit .478 and was drawing the attention of scouts near and far. He played football and had a scholarship offer from Michigan State. In baseball, the hometown Detroit Tigers were interested, as were the Cardinals. The legendary Branch Rickey, by then in his 80s and confined to a wheelchair, arrived in Detroit, ventured to a field and emerged from a black limousine to see Deras play. The Cardinals eventually offered Deras an $80,000 signing bonus, big money for the time, and viewed him as a third baseman.

In Rickey’s papers, now housed at the Library of Congress, there are two scouting reports filed on Deras. The first, dated June 5, 1964, hints at his potential.

“I see nothing (sic) whatever wrong with his form,” Rickey wrote. “His head goes toward the pitch with every swing. He should be a good hitter, and his form supports his record for power.”

The second is dated July 14, 1964, soon after Deras began his pro career, and hints at what was to come.

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“In the game tonight he looked like he had a case of cramps — came out of his shell late,” Rickey wrote. “Showed no power. I believe he will become a good hitter, a power hitter, someday. Surely he will come to be a bit (more) relaxed. I hope that management will not advise about his batting or change him in any respect until, per chance he gives up.”


By the numbers, Art Deras’ professional baseball career amounted to this: A .243 career batting average and 32 home runs over five seasons in the minor leagues. He spent all of 1966 and 1967 in Double-A Arkansas, before a demotion to Class A the following year.

“I couldn’t understand why he never made it in the major leagues,” Paciorek said. “I said that. ‘If Arty can’t play in the big leagues, there’s no way I can.’”

Done with baseball, Deras served in the National Guard for a few years, then headed home to the Detroit area. He applied for a job at the police force and settled into a quiet life. He got married and had two children. Kevin was the first. A few years later came a girl, Deb.

In the years after his baseball career ended, Deras had a fractured relationship with the sport. He battled depression and wanted nothing to do with the game.

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“People come up to me even now and ask why I quit,” Deras said in 1983. “I just tell them it was because of personal reasons. … By the time I was 21, I had already had a full 14-year career — playing every day, two amateur championships, a room full of trophies. I should have been reaching my prime and I was exhausted. Looking back on it, I guess it was just a problem of getting too much too soon.”

Eventually, baseball’s idyllic rhythms drew him back. He played rec softball and began watching the Tigers every night. He even ventured to Tiger Stadium to see Pacoriek play when the White Sox were in town.

Kevin has faint memories of going to a reunion for the Little League team one year in Hamtramck, but even then he didn’t quite ascertain how big of a deal it was. Kevin also played baseball growing up. His father didn’t push him into the sport, he says, but he didn’t hold him back from it, either. As for the subject of Art’s own Little League career? It just wasn’t a topic that came up very often.

Truth was, Art could be closed off to a fault. Kevin and Deb both speak highly of their father, but Kevin acknowledges a certain emotional distance. He pieced together more about his father’s career over the years, and one year before his birthday, he called the Little League Museum in Williamsport, Pa. He told them his father had played on a championship team, and he was hoping to acquire some film to give his dad a special gift.

“Did you say ‘Deras?’” a worker asked over the phone.

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“Yeah, my dad was Art Deras,” Kevin replied.

“Like Art ‘Pinky’ Deras?”

“Yeah.”

“Hold please.”

Kevin split the costs to help the museum convert old 8mm reel tape to DVD. He presented the rediscovered film to his father, including the ninth inning of the championship game and the ensuing celebration, when eight kids mobbed their bigger teammate as he walked off the mound.

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“It was really hard to judge his reaction,” Kevin said. “You could tell he appreciated it. He was intrigued watching it. But it may have brought back some bad memories.”


Jane Chupailo was a waitress at a Ram’s Horn restaurant off Dequindre Street, and occasionally the police officers who came in would point to Art Deras and ask her: Do you know who that is?

“No,” she might say. “I just knew he had nice biceps.”

Art was 12 years her senior, divorced with two children of his own. One day he swung by her house anyway, and soon they were dating. It wasn’t until sometime later her father pulled her aside.

“Jane,” he said. “Do you know who that is?”

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Deras during his career as a police officer.

Jane had a big family that loved sports, and from time to time, she would hear Art discuss his career with her father or brother. But it wasn’t until Kevin got another call from the Little League Museum that all the pieces started falling into place.

Two filmmakers, Brian Kruger and Buddy Moorehouse, had inquired about a project they were interested in. Museum director Lance Van Auken gave them another idea: Do something on Pinky Deras. The project turned into the 2010 documentary “The Legend of Pinky Deras.”

The Art who appears in the film is quiet and speaks in a matter-of-fact tone, but Jane says the project energized him. As for everyone else, including son Kevin, it wasn’t until the documentary that they finally realized the full extent of his legend. By then Kevin was approaching 40.

“It took that amount of time,” he said, “to realize how exceptional he was.”

Deb, the daughter from Art’s first marriage, married a man who enjoyed baseball, and they eventually moved out to Arizona. They had three boys who took an interest. Visits back to Michigan soon meant questions, and slowly Deb began learning more about all her father had accomplished. Her youngest son now plays baseball at Paradise Valley Community College in Arizona, and this summer, he ordered a custom glove with the words Pinky Deras inscribed on the glove’s smallest finger.

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Adam was the youngest, 30 years younger than his half-brother. The dynamic was unusual. But Jane called Adam her miracle baby, finally conceived at age 40 after three surgeries and three attempts at in-vitro fertilization.

Though Art and Jane divorced when Adam was in fifth grade, they remained on good terms. Art spoiled his son and let him do anything. Perhaps the only thing that ever made him hesitant was baseball. Adam played the sport growing up and says his father was supportive, but Jane says it was her brother who first signed him up.

“I thought Art was gonna hit the roof,” Jane said. “He was so angry.”

Jane called Art’s baseball career “his Berlin Wall.” A line she simply wouldn’t cross.

“Some people … I don’t even know how to explain it,” she said. “You have things you’ll talk about, but there’s things you keep in your heart.”

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The children each have slightly different theories on why he didn’t divulge more.

Maybe it was simply his personality, a quiet man who never sought to talk about himself.

“He was happy with the fame he got,” Deb said. “He didn’t care about moving on. It just wasn’t meant to be. … He never regretted it.”

Maybe it was deeper than that. The pain of not making it further as a professional, of not quite meeting all the expectations of greatness others had bestowed upon him.

“It’s a hard thing when people expect something out of you and you can’t produce,” Adam said. “He had some issues with that.”

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Or perhaps it went even further, memories of a robbed youth he buried in hopes of forging a new identity.

“Why he decided not to talk about it, I think it was a little bit of the letdown,” Kevin said. “Didn’t want to relive it because of the could-woulda-shouldas. He probably had some regrets. Maybe after leaving, if he decided to go back, maybe he didn’t think people would take him back.”

By the time Adam grew up and moved out, he called his father every morning at 5 a.m.

Adam worked mornings, and Art was religious about his routines. He would rise and drink coffee in a dark house every day at 4 a.m. At night he would sit down with a bowl of vanilla ice cream and watch the Tigers.

By the end he was reclusive. The once-great athlete had stopped exercising after a back injury many years before. He grew inactive and health issues followed. If Art didn’t answer Adam’s early morning phone calls, something was wrong. He had battled heart problems for years. One day after an episode he checked into the hospital, and a couple of nights later, on June 5, 2022, the kids learned he died in his sleep at age 75.

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In the days after, they all heard stories they never knew before. Old friends and teammates reached out. The best stories always involved Art’s days playing baseball. There was happiness in stories like that, but there could be a certain sadness, too.

“There were so many unanswered questions,” Kevin said. “So many questions not asked. And some of those questions I tried to ask and never really got a lot of response on. That’s part of it. I guess I missed out on some closure. … My regret is not getting into enough detail and trying to drill deep as far as his mindset and the pressure.”

Many of those answers will remain forever elusive. But if those closest to him looked hard enough, there were sometimes the smallest hints at the feelings Pinky Deras kept locked inside.

Every year around the time of the Little League World Series, he would take his usual seat on the couch and tune in. More than once, after a kid made an amazing play or after a new team got crowned as champions, Jane would look over. And if she timed it right, she would catch Art Deras, the greatest Little Leaguer to ever play, with tears welling in his eyes.

(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic. All images courtesy of Adam Deras)

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Kyren Williams' running makes Rams a threat in the postseason, if they make it

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Kyren Williams' running makes Rams a threat in the postseason, if they make it

The florescent green cleats of Kyren Williams could be seen from space.

But it was the feet inside those shoes that set the tone Sunday in the Rams’ 19-9 victory over the New York Jets.

In this final stretch before the NFL playoffs, when the weather turns as bitter cold as it was at MetLife Stadium, it’s essential for teams to be able to run the football. Williams did that for the Rams, gaining 122 yards in 23 carries at a robust average of 5.3 yards a pop.

“It’s a security blanket,” Rams right tackle Rob Havenstein said. “There’s a ton of good rush fronts out there in the league, but to be able to run the ball and kind of dictate how we want to play offense because we can run the ball, that’s something that doesn’t just show up on game day. It’s something we work really hard on during the week.”

The numbers weren’t splashy. The highlights were sparse. But for the Rams to travel across the country for a 10 a.m. body-clock kickoff, with temperatures in the teens, this workmanlike win was a resounding statement: This team is capable of doing some damage in the playoffs.

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Twenty-three carries is a full plate — the Rams only had a 50 offensive plays — but it was fewer than Williams had in his previous two games, when he had 29 and 29.

“Not quite 29,” coach Sean McVay quipped, “so he’s fresh.”

Fresh as the opportunities unfurling before the team. With the Rams winning, and Arizona losing at Carolina, the once-surging Cardinals have been eliminated from the playoff picture. They play the Rams at SoFi Stadium on Saturday night, and figure to be less formidable with running back James Conner dealing with an apparent knee injury that sidelined him in the second half Sunday.

So the NFC West race comes down to the Rams and Seattle, who play in a season finale in Los Angeles. The Rams have the upper hand at this point, with a better record after the Seahawks lost to the Vikings on Sunday and already having won at Seattle.

Meanwhile, the Jets are a mess, not news to the thousands of disgruntled fans streaming to the MetLife exits throughout the second half.

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They have fired their coach and general manager, and seem to have handed the decision-making to quarterback Aaron Rodgers, who went for it on fourth down five times and converted two against the Rams.

According to ESPN, the Jets are the first team in 25 years to not punt in a game and still be held to fewer than 10 points.

Rams running back Kyren Williams carried the ball 23 times against the Jets after carrying it 29 times in each of his last two games.

(Seth Wenig / Associated Press)

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What’s more, every one of their offensive linemen was flagged for a penalty, and there were six of those players since the Jets had to sub in a replacement for their injured left tackle. Dutifully, fill-in Max Mitchell checked the box with a false start just before the two-minute warning.

And to think the game began with such promise for the home team, the Jets assembling their first 99-yard scoring drive in eight years on their opening possession.

The Rams tightened the screws after that and surrendered only a field goal. Not to say it was a pristine defensive performance, though, as the tackling still needs to be better to increase the chance of survival in the postseason.

In many respects, it was a weird game that — thanks to all the running — glided by with the speed of time-lapse photography. The Rams were already in the fourth quarter while some teams were still waiting to start the second half.

The game went so quickly, in fact, that the NFL had to pump the brakes with commercials. The league doesn’t like to go commercial-kickoff-commercial, yet it had to do that three times in Rams-Jets in order to fill the three-hour window.

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Rams Braden Fiske (55) and Jared Verse (8) sack Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers (8).

Rams Braden Fiske (55) and Jared Verse (8) converge to sack Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers (8).

(Adam Hunger / Associated Press)

The Jets had the ball for the final 6 minutes, 22 seconds of the first half, then — because they received the kickoff to start the second half — held it for the first 10 minutes of the third quarter.

“I was like, ‘I haven’t played football in 30 minutes,’” Havenstein said. “This wasn’t the game to get tight out there. You ain’t gonna get warmed up any time.”

That was definitely the feeling on the visitors’ sideline.

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“We were huddled up against that heater on the sideline, that’s all you could do,” Rams guard Kevin Dotson said. “We’re not used to it. It was like 12 degrees, 13, and it seemed to get even colder at the end. I’m from Louisiana, so I’m thin-skinned. That cold is different.

“As offensive linemen they tell you, ‘Don’t wear sleeves.’ I gotta wear sleeves. I won’t be the same person if I don’t wear sleeves. I put my sleeves on and just go hard enough where they can’t say, ‘Oh, he’s soft.’”

The strong performance on the ground was a testament not only to Williams but also to a stalwart Rams offensive line that only recently has come together as intended with the starters all getting healthy (enough) to operate in lockstep.

As for those bright green shoes Williams was wearing? They were the Nike Vapor Edge Kobe “Grinch” cleats, an homage to one of his all-time favorite athletes.

Grinch makes sense. For the Jets, he unquestionably stole Christmas.

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How Morocco became a burgeoning football superpower

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How Morocco became a burgeoning football superpower

With its clay terraces, the ochre-coloured Stade El Harti in Marrakech’s bustling Gueliz district is a venue that neatly demonstrates the transformation in Moroccan football over the past decade.

Until 2010, it was the 10,000-capacity home to Kawkab Athletique Club de Marrakech, a middle-ranking side who could not wait to move to a 45,000-seater stadium on the other side of the city, built originally for the World Cup that summer which instead was hosted by South Africa.

For the next eight years, a largely redundant El Harti felt like it belonged to a lost age. Yet as the Moroccan state realised how useful football could be and started investing heavily in the sport, it found that something old might also be something valuable.

In 2018, El Harti was reopened, after a new irrigation system was installed, along with lighting and a sweep of blue and red seats. The development means Marrakesh now has an infrastructure that makes it a potential destination when other African international teams and clubs visit Morocco for training camps and tournaments — just one example of a wider strategy to harness football as a way of making friends and influencing people on their own continent and beyond.

This is a big five years for Africa’s fifth richest country.

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A year from now, Morocco will host the African Cup of Nations for just the second time in its history, and the first since 1988. In 2030, it will be one of the three main co-hosts for the men’s World Cup, along with Spain and Portugal (three other countries, Paraguay, Argentina and Uruguay will stage one-off matches to mark the 100th anniversary of the inaugural tournament, played in Uruguay). It will be only the second time an African country will have staged games in the tournament, following South Africa 2010. 

Just outside Casablanca, the sprawling port city which is Morocco’s economic and business centre, a new stadium is being constructed — the Grand Stade Hassan II which, with a planned capacity of 115,000, will be the largest football ground in the world and a symbol of the country’s new-found status as one of the world game’s emerging powers. Many in the country have not given up hope the stadium — widely reported to have cost around $500million (£398m), although precise figures are vague — will stage the tournament’s final.


An artist’s rendition of the proposed Stade Hassan II (Populous via Handout/Getty Images)

It does not end there. Before that World Cup, Morocco is also scheduled to host the next five editions of the Under-17 Women’s World Cup, annually from 2025, and, in April, capital city Rabat is expected to host the next World Football Summit, a meeting involving the game’s leaders and industry experts.

It is some journey for a country that did not qualify for the World Cup for two decades until 2018, before reaching the competition’s semi-finals two years ago. And this journey is unlikely to end in 2030.

Morocco has big plans for football — and it feels like a country in a hurry.

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Like one of the cool courtyards known as riads that shelter beyond the ancient doors and steep walls in the souks of Marrakech’s famed Medina quarter, the El Harti offers sanctuary from the choking roads around it.

Last Monday, however, the ground was a hive of activity, hosting a friendly match between local and international legends sides ahead of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) awards ceremony being held just down the road at the Palais des Congres. It was closed to the public, but the stadium was swarmed by people courtesy of a presidential-style safety operation involving auxiliary command and shades-wearing guards from private security firm G4S.

Patrice Motsepe, president of CAF, and FIFA president Gianni Infantino were supposed to be on the guest list, but neither showed up. Instead, the only figure with an official title involved in the kickabout worked in the CAF press office.

Infantino would though spend his evening in the auditorium of the Palais, flanked by Motsepe on one side and two Moroccans on the other — Aziz Akhannouch, the country’s prime minister, and Fouzi Lekjaa, one of the most influential men in African football.


Lekjaa is president of the Moroccan FA and one of Africa’s most powerful football figures (Fadel Senna/AFP via Getty Images)

Having assumed office as the president of the Royal Moroccan Football Association in 2014, Lekjaa was elected to FIFA’s council in 2021, the year he also became Morocco’s “minister delegate of the budget” on the recommendation of Akhannouch — a role which essentially means he has the keys to the country’s safe.

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The highly respected Lekjaa is a technocrat and was appointed without being affiliated to any party or movement. He earned the responsibility out of politics. Akhannouch proposed his job title, which was subsequently approved by King Mohammed VI.

Lekjaa has the potential to have a significant impact on Morocco’s economic and political landscape. Ultimately, any country’s position on football does not change without political will even if, according to FIFA, this can only happen within its rules, which forbid “government interference of any kind”. 

Motsepe, who made his billions in the minerals industry, talked rather loosely about the wider environment in which he is operating, using his fists to emphasise the valuable points he wished to get across, including thanking figures such as Lekjaa for his role in “developing African football”.

The ceremony ended up celebrating the continent’s politicians almost as much as it did its footballers, with Motsepe and Infantino, described by one of the hosts as “the stars of the show”, handing out “outstanding achievement” awards to not one but two sitting African presidents, though neither of Egypt’s Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and Paul Biya of Cameroon turned up to collect them. 

Motsepe wanted to send a message to all 54 African heads of state that “success comes from them”. As far as he is concerned, if countries support football by building stadiums and creating an environment where players are paid well, “then we will keep them in Africa”. Infantino nodded his head in agreement. 

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Despite being on the edge of Africa geographically (eight nautical miles from Spain at the nearest point), Morocco has made itself a central hub for the continent in football terms — a position strengthened by the announcement on Monday that FIFA will open its first permanent African headquarters in Marrakech. FIFA also has regional bureaus in Senegal and Rwanda and it expects Marrakech will act like its branches in Paris and the U.S. city of Miami, which have recently become more influential, controlling commercial and legal services across Europe and the Americas.


FIFA president Infantino reveals Morocco as one of the 2030 World Cup co-hosts (Harold Cunningham – FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images)

This development followed a press release from Morocco’s ministry of tourism on the same morning that claimed the country was on track to overtake north African neighbour Egypt as the region’s most visited destination. By the end of November, Morocco had already beaten its yearly target of 15 million tourists by almost a million. The ministry predicts that football will stimulate interest and economic growth: it wants to attract 17m tourists by 2026 and 26m by 2030.

These are ambitious numbers, but Morocco is clearly not lacking in confidence.

A cavalcade of people-carriers escorted the nominees and their families to the towering entrance of the Palais, which was decked out entirely in black and gold rigging like a Las Vegas hotel ahead of a big fight. The only sour note was sounded when it was revealed that Ademola Lookman of Nigeria had been voted the Men’s African Player of the Year, beating the Moroccan candidate Achraf Hakimi.

After gasps in the audience, many got up and started to leave before Lookman, born in south London, was able to start his acceptance speech.

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For Morocco and Lekjaa, perhaps this will act as a valuable reminder: if you promote something as enthusiastically as this country has, it is better to win.


Before earning the rights to 2030, Morocco had five failed attempts at hosting the World Cup, starting in 1994.

It has long been an internationalist and ambitious country, but until recently has struggled to convince neighbours and nations further afield alike of its potential.

Morocco’s approach changed a decade ago after it made the late decision to pull out of hosting the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON), scheduled for early 2015, because of fears about the spread of the Ebola virus, a decision that antagonised its neighbours, who accused the country of caring more about European tourism than its own continent.

Morocco did not have a member on the CAF executive committee to defend its case and was fined €8million (£6.6m/$8.3m at current exchange rates) by the continental body and had its national team banned from competing in the 2017 and 2019 editions of AFCON, held in Gabon and Egypt. 

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Quickly, Moroccan officials realised what it had lost.

Earlier that year, the country had closely watched events beyond its eastern border in Algeria, whose national team was stirring excitement on a run to the last 16 of the World Cup in Brazil, where they were narrowly beaten 2-1 by eventual champions Germany after extra time.

It would be understandable if there was some jealousy in Morocco, which had not qualified for a World Cup since 1998. It had also underachieved at AFCON, with its most recent, and only, title coming in 1976 (which is still the case).


Morocco’s appearance at the 1998 World Cup was its last for 20 years (AllsportUK /Allsport)

A change in direction was needed and football — previously viewed as simply part of the entertainment industry — became a political priority. 

And the man at the front of that change was Lekjaa.

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His decision to pivot Morocco’s focus back to Africa ensured that ruling to exclude the country from the next two AFCONs was eased, with participation in 2017 allowed. In a couple of years, Morocco spent around €80million on football infrastructure projects and though that investment has since increased further, it has learnt to be more discreet about the numbers involved due to the threat of populist pushback, with other sectors requiring financial attention from the state.

An opportunity also presented itself when the CAF president of 29 years, Cameroon’s Issa Hayatou, was surprisingly ousted at the organisation’s general congress after a string of corruption allegations and criticism over a television rights deal which guaranteed a huge sum of money to CAF.

Hayatou was, surprisingly, replaced by Madagascar’s Ahmad Ahmad, but in reality, his vice-presidents had as much, if not more, power than him and what followed was one of the most chaotic periods in CAF history, with stories leaking almost every month of alleged impropriety within the organisation. 

As it became clear Ahmad would not be in place for long, Morocco quietly set about positioning itself as the grown-up in the room. 

This involved initially offering to host a series of CAF symposiums where members gathered to discuss new ideas. Other, loss-making events would follow, but when Motsepe replaced Ahmad in 2021 following the latter’s own corruption scandal, it became very clear to other nations that Morocco was serious about its continental role. This mattered when it came to votes during CAF elections as well as FIFA votes.

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In 2022, Morocco became the first African or Arab nation to reach a World Cup semi-final. It was widely hailed as one of the competition’s great underdog stories, capturing hearts and minds well beyond the continent, but it did not happen by accident.

While the seductive appeal of football has meant the country could engage with the rest of the world, its newfound position was only possible because of huge investment in sports facilities which, according to Simon Chadwick, a professor in sport and geographical economy, had “never been seen in Europe or, more recently, the Middle East”.

One of the most striking was a $65million state-of-the-art football academy named after King Mohammed VI. The facility, located just outside Rabat, covers an area of 2.5km squared and boasts a school, medical centre and four pitches, all modelled around the layout of a traditional Moroccan douar (village). By 2017, five other regional training centres were built in different parts of the country, though the Moroccan FA did not reveal costings for each of the projects.

Post-2022, there was an acknowledgement in Morocco that the achievement of their men’s team at Qatar 2022 — topping a group containing two of the 2018 tournament’s final four in Croatia and Belgium, then beating Spain and Portugal before a semi-final loss to holders and eventual runners-up France — would not have been possible without the performances of players from the country’s diaspora.

Spanish-born Hakimi, who plays for Paris Saint-Germain, was the most high-profile example and was the poster boy of that campaign in Qatar, but nearly 70 per cent of that squad were born in Europe, are based there, or both.

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Achraf Hakimi was Morocco’s star of the 2022 World Cup (Elsa/Getty Images)

Scouting has improved in Morocco, as have the facilities that can be deployed to develop local talent, but many of these players, as well as head coach Walid Regragui (who was born in Paris, and still lives there), were ultimately a product of the European system.

Though it is not as competitive as Egypt in terms of the levels of salaries being offered to players, leading Moroccan clubs, with quality infrastructures behind them, have started to fill the prime places in Africa’s continental competitions: Casablanca’s Wydad lifted the CAF Champions League in 2017 and 2022 and their city rivals Raja won the CAF Confederation Cup in 2018 and 2021 (Africa’s version of the UEFA Europa League).

go-deeper

GO DEEPER

Boufal, Bono and Hakimi’s ‘bad’ penalties – stories of Morocco’s unlikely heroes

Morocco aspires to create its own footballers and, ideally, pay them well enough to play for clubs at home, as many of Egypt’s top stars do, rather than moving abroad. Of the 16 fastest-growing economies in 2024, 16 are African and with Morocco placed at the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea, it is handily positioned to become a regional power in the same way as Egypt has due to its connection with the Suez Canal.

Professor Chadwick says that while Morocco is not a particularly rich country, it does have the geography and resources to stimulate economic and political power. This is mainly because 70 per cent of the world’s known phosphate reserves (used in everything from food to cosmetics to electronics) are in Morocco and much of it is managed by the OCP Group, which is owned by the state and the country’s biggest employer.

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Last summer, it signed a deal with the football federation and private partners to create, according to a press release issued by OCP and the government, a “national training fund dedicated to the professionalisation of training centres and the promotion of young talent”.

As a co-host in 2030, Morocco will have to spend less than it would if staging the World Cup solo, yet it is expected to receive the same benefits. When the tournament was last held on its continent, South Africa had to build new stadiums and repurpose existing ones at tremendous cost. Some of those are now white elephants 14 years on, but Morocco is confident it will not face the same problem due to the advances made over the past decade as well as the popularity of the game in the country. Whereas in South Africa football has rugby union and cricket to contend with, in Morocco, it stands alone.

In 2022, business magazine Forbes reported that Qatar had spent as much as $220billion in the dozen years since being chosen as a World Cup host in late 2010 — more than 15 times what Russia spent putting on the 2018 event. Morocco does not have the same well of money Qatar does but intends to earn back whatever it has put in to secure a major role in 2030, though it will be difficult to judge the success due to a lack of transparency over the scale of its investments.

Chadwick says that over the last 10 years, football has acted as a glue: managing the country’s image and profile through soft power and diplomacy. AFCON and the World Cup coming its way justifies all of the spending, albeit at a time when many still live under tents temporary tents in the Atlas Mountains following a devastating earthquake in 2023.

While poverty is still very visible in rural areas, Morocco accelerates with its building plans, most notably the Grand Stade Hassan II. During the CAF awards nearly three hours down the road in Marrakech, every official from the organisation, as well as journalists, were convinced the venue will host the 2030 World Cup final, ahead of Spain’s big two venues — Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeu and Camp Nou in Barcelona.

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Though it is clear that Morocco has used football to make friends and influence people, there is a hard-nosed element to the strategy. 

It really wants to show the rest of the world what it can do.

(Top photo: Tullio M Puglia/Getty Images)

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Ravens coach John Harbaugh shares powerful Christmas message after clinching playoff berth

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Ravens coach John Harbaugh shares powerful Christmas message after clinching playoff berth

The Baltimore Ravens clinched a playoff berth with their victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers on Saturday, but head coach John Harbaugh had an important message to share before he addressed the team’s success on the field. 

Speaking to reporters after the 34-17 victory, Harbaugh began with something he said was “important” to him and many people around the world. And that was to acknowledge the spirit of Christmas.

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson throws from the pocket against the Pittsburgh Steelers at M&T Bank Stadium. (Tommy Gilligan-Imagn Images)

“I read this to the team in our postgame prayer and it’s this – this is Mary. Mary, the mother of God, said this when she was with Elizabeth. She said this, ‘My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior.’ So, I just want to wish everybody a Merry Christmas, happy holiday season, and rejoice,” he said. 

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“Rejoice. Rejoice in life. Rejoice in your circumstances. Rejoice in the tough games. Rejoice in the losses. Rejoice in the wins like we’re blessed to do today as a football team, and just rejoice in the people that you love, the people that are close to you. Rejoice. We aren’t here on this Earth to worry about every little thing and spar with one another. We’re here to rejoice in one another and with one another and love one another. Let’s try to remember that this week. This is a big football week – it’s also a big life week. It’s a big spiritual week.”  

John Harbaugh talks to repoters

Ravens head coach John Harbaugh talks to reporters following the Pittsburgh Steelers game on Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024, in Baltimore. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

The Ravens will return on a short week to play the Houston Texans on Christmas Day.

RAVENS TAKE DOWN STEELERS TO KEEP AFC NORTH RACE OPEN

The game comes after a big win over division rival Pittsburgh in what could’ve meant the Steelers clinching the division title with a win. Instead, the Steelers and Ravens are now deadlocked. 

“I feel like we’ve been busting our behind all season long, had ups and downs throughout this whole season, but to clinch a playoff against a great team like that, that’s great,” quarterback Lamar Jackson said. “That means we’re moving in the right direction.”

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Jackson improved to 2-4 against the Steelers as a starter and recorded his NFL-leading 37th touchdown. 

Russell Wilson in Baltimore

Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Russell Wilson tacked at M&T Bank Stadium. (Tommy Gilligan-Imagn Images)

The Steelers will also play Christmas day against the Kansas City Chiefs. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

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