Handball: the French team focuses its attention on the World Cup

The French men’s handball team will be facing an extremely busy schedule at the beginning of 2021 with, in the space of ten weeks, a series of major European, world and Olympic events.

This marathon has already begun with the qualifying matches for the Euro 2022 against Serbia. The significance of these matches is all the greater as they are the first for Guillaume Gille in his position as coach. With one defeat and one draw, France, in 2nd position in Group 1, can continue to hope that it will ultimately qualify… but there will be no room for mistakes when playing against Greece and Belgium in April and May later this year.

But before that, the World Cup will be staged behind closed doors in Egypt from January 13 to 31. Starting this Thursday, the Bleus will have to be in attack mode from the very outset. They will play their first match of the World Cup in the preliminary round against Norway, before meeting Austria on January 16 and the United States on January 18.
 In order to move on to the main round, the French team will have to take one of the top three places in their group (E). If they qualify, the players coached by Guillaume Gille will find themselves with the top 3 in Group F, which includes Portugal, Algeria, Iceland, and Morocco.

And it’s far from over! After the World Cup, the French handball players will only have a short break before competing in the Olympic qualifying tournament in Montpellier (March 12-14).

A major partner of handball, the Caisse d’Epargne has been supporting the French women’s and men’s handball teams since January 2015. Follow all the news about the French men’s handball team on Facebook : Esprit Handball et Twitter : @EspritHandball

The World Cup program

Preliminary round: 

Norway – France on January 14th at 8:30 pm on beIN SPORTS 
Austria – France on January 16th at 6:00 pm on beIN SPORTS and TMC
France – United States on January 18th at 6:00 pm on beIN SPORTS
Main round (3 games): January 20th to 24th
Quarter-finals: January 27th
Semi-finals: January 29th
Finals: January 31st

Photo credit©FFHANDBALL