Kylian Mbappé notched his 20th FIFA World Cup goal, bouncing back from a saved first-half penalty to fire France to a 2-0 quarter-final win over Morocco in Foxborough, keeping Les Bleus on course for a third straight World Cup final.

France came flying out of the blocks, chasing a repeat of the early breakthrough that carried them to a 2-0 semi-final win over Morocco in Qatar three-and-a-half years ago. Morocco keeper Bono stood tall early on, scrambling to his near post to turn Mbappé’s low effort around the post before reacting sharply to deny Dayot Upamecano’s downward header from the resulting corner.

Having weathered that opening spell, Morocco settled into a deep, compact defensive block designed to choke off space for France’s attacking threats.

The danger of stepping out of that defensive shape showed itself when Morocco were caught in a rare attacking sortie, allowing Mbappé to burst into the box and win a penalty off a rash Noussair Mazraoui challenge. After a tense wait of more than three minutes, Mbappé finally stepped up — but his stuttered run-up didn’t fool Bono, who guessed correctly and comfortably held the tame spot-kick.

Morocco held on until half-time, though not before Lucas Digne rattled the crossbar with an ambitious, dipping effort from range.

France’s frustration carried the spot kick. second half until Mbappé produced a moment of individual brilliance to break the deadlock on the hour mark. Shaking off his penalty miss, the 27-year-old curled a shot from the edge of the box, using Issa Diop as a decoy to bend the ball around the far post and into the corner of Bono’s net.

With Morocco’s resistance finally cracked, their semi-final hopes were extinguished soon after by Ousmane Dembélé, who exploited the space created by Mbappé’s decoy run and drilled a low, powerful finish past Bono to make it 2-0.

At the other end, Mike Maignan and France’s defence calmly repelled Morocco’s late push, securing a third consecutive clean sheet. France now head into Tuesday’s semi-final against the winner of Spain or Belgium full of momentum.