Former Arsenal and England striker Ian Wright has admitted he’s loving the performances of Chelsea star Hakim Ziyech at the World Cup for Morocco.

Despite his struggles at Stamford Bridge, Ziyech has helped Morocco enjoy an incredible and history-making run to the World Cup semi-finals in Qatar.

According to Wright, Ziyech plays with a different energy for Morocco than he does for Chelsea.

“I’m loving Hakim Ziyech at this World Cup, I’m loving him,” Wright said on the Wrighty’s House podcast. “I love the way he’s playing.

“He plays with a different energy when he plays for his country. I watch him at Chelsea and I’m not being negative, but the difference is this man needs it when he’s playing for Morocco.

“Remember he had all those problems with the [previous] coach, he wasn’t playing, then the coach is gone, they got their guy in and look at where they are now.”

Liverpool legend Graeme Souness was full of praise for Ziyech and his Moroccan teammates after they dumped Portugal out of the World Cup, just days after they did same to Spain.

“It is part of history,” Souness said.

“I have to be honest, I thought Portugal will have looked at what happened to Spain and said ‘this won’t be us. We are going to get on the front foot, we have got better strikers, we will score goals against them and it could be an easy night’.

“But they didn’t do that. When you are a player on the pitch, when the ball goes out of play, you drift and start to think, ‘oh no, this is happening’.

“When the goalkeeper comes and you find yourself 1-0 down, the alarm bells are ringing in your head. At no time was it last ditch for Morocco. By and large, Morocco handled it very well.”