Interesting draw for France 2017 | Handball Planet
Index category

Interesting draw for France 2017

Today, the groups for the 2017 Men’s World Championship in France were determined. The 24 teams were drawn into four groups of six, with hosts France having had the right to choose which group they wanted to join. The draw was conducted by Per Bertelsen, Caretaker Chairman of the IHF Commission of Organizing and Competitions, assisted by French comedian Claudia Tagbo, famous French players Bruno Martini and Nina Kanto, as well as Paralympic athlete Timothée Adolphe.

Hosts and defending world champions France joined Group A, where they will face Poland, bronze medallists at Qatar 2015, Russia, Brazil, Japan and Norway, who were awarded the Wild Card by the IHF Council.

In Group B, EHF EURO 2016 runners-up Spain will meet Slovenia, Macedonia, Iceland and the two African teams from Tunisia and Angola.

Reigning European Champions Germany compete against Croatia, EHF EURO 2016 bronze medallists, Belarus, Hungary, Chile, runners-up at the 2016 Pan American Men’s Championship, and Saudi Arabia in Group C.

Group D will be probably the most challenging group with 2015 runners-up and Asian Champions Qatar facing the strong handball nations Denmark and Sweden, as well as Africa’s current number one team Egypt, Bahrain and Argentina, bronze medallists at the Pan American Men’s Championship. All of these teams, except for Bahrain, will meet already in August at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. However, Bahrain showed at the Olympic Qualification Tournaments already that they are more than capable to keep up with the ‘big’ nations.

In the opening match of the 2017 Men’s World Championship France will play against Brazil.

Results

Group A

FRA, POL, RUS, BRA, JPN, NOR

Group B

ESP, SLO, MKD, ISL, TUN, ANG

Group C

GER, CRO, BLR, HUN, CHI, KSA

Group D

QAT, DEN, SWE, EGY, BRN, ARG

source: IHF.info

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

To Top