Morocco and France reached the World Cup last four on Saturday, setting up the second semifinal scheduled to take place on December 14.

Unlike Croatia and Argentina's journey through extra time and penalties to first reach the last four a day earlier, both of Saturday's matches ended in normal time.

Morocco's Youssef En-Nesyri scored the only goal of the match against Portugal with a first-half header, as his side became the first African team to reach the World Cup semifinals.

A few hours later, Olivier Giroud's late goal sealed France's win over England at 2-1, after Aurelien Tchouameni put his side in front with a 25-meter shot 17 minutes in and England's captain Harry Kane leveled from the penalty spot early in the second half.

Portugal began brightly as Joao Felix made clean contact with a diving header after Bruno Fernandes' floating free-kick but it was parried away by goalkeeper Yassine Bounou. Guerreiro then had a first-time volley blocked by Achraf Hakimi after another Fernandes delivery into the penalty area.

Morocco soon composed themselves as En-Nesyri headed over from a corner and Hakim Ziyech cut inside Otavio before lashing a left-footed drive wide.

Fernandes almost struck an equalizer as he tried his luck from an acute angle only to see the ball deflect off the crossbar.

Cristiano Ronaldo was introduced in the 51st minute as a replacement for Ruben Neves, as manager Fernando Santos started with Goncalo Ramos who scored an impressive hat-trick against Switzerland. Santos commented post-match that he did not regret starting the megastar on the bench. 

Ramos had his first genuine chance just before the hour, heading wide from 12 yards after Otavio's cross and Fernandes then hammered a shot over the bar.

Felix drew a brilliant one handed save from from Bounou after running onto Ronaldo's one-touch pass and curling a dipping shot that appeared headed for the far corner.

Ronaldo then latched onto a through ball before lashing a low attempt straight at Bounou.

Later, in the last quarterfinal in Qatar, England had more chances to shoot on goal than France overall, but were not as efficient at converting them.

French veteran Antoine Griezmann set up both Tchouameni's opener and Giroud's late header to keep alive his team's hopes of defending their title.

English youngsters Jude Bellingham, Bukayo Saka, Phil Foden, Declan Rice and others showed quality throughout, making England's next attempt to grab a major tournament triumph promising, after narrowly missing out on this one.

The pressure mounted on Kane when he came to the penalty spot for the second time of the night, right in front of Tottenham Hotspur teammate Hugo Lloris who knew him too well.

The ball went high over the bar, and so did Marcus Rashford's free-kick in the last minute. Both would have been able to drag the match into extra time if successful.

"We win and lose as a team. We've let a couple of goals in, and missed a few chances. So he's been incredible for us, so reliable in those sort of situations. We wouldn't be here but for the number of goals he's scored for us," England manager Gareth Southgate commented on Kane later.

"We were here to try to win the tournament. We had the belief that we could, and we showed in our performance tonight against the reigning champions, that we have a team that could have done that," said Southgate.

(With input from Xinhua)