France are the second semi-finalists of the World Championship 2017! The host team didn’t allowed Sweden 32:30 (15:16) to stop their phenomenal handball fairytale among French cities in this two weeks. The last stop will be in Paris Bercy hall, and the rival in semi-final will be known after Slovenia – Qatar clash.
It looked that French team will have result under control until the end of first half, but Mikkel Appelgren was much better than his rival Thierry Omeyer and that pushed Scandinavian side toward advantage on the break with Jimmy Gottfridsson in the main role for series 5:2 (13:11 – 15:16).
Sweden came back into the lead in 47th minute after Gottfridsson netted fo 25:24, but two minutes later Niklas Ekberg was stopped by Vincent Gerrard to put his team on +2. Saves of Montpellier’s goalie brought back selfconfidence of his team by goals of Nedim Remili, who put reigning World Champions on +2 in 53rd minute – 28:26, when Swedish bench called time-out.
However, French machine couldn’t be stopped. Karabatic and Co. supported by fantastic fans cruised to semi-finals.
