France are the first finalists of the IHF World Championship 2017! The host team of the phenomenal handball weeks will have chance to win sixth World’s gold medal in front of noisy crowded Bercy hall in Sunday at 17.30 hrs. Didier Dinart boys had no problem to put Slovenia behind 31:25 (15:12) in front of 16.000 fans, who have no worries about the name of winning team, as Karabatic and his team-mates had control over the game from the first to the last moment. The Man of the Match was French goalkeepers Vincent Gerrard with 15 saves.
After two goals in situation with two and one player less on the court, which put them on +4 – 6:2, nobody could expect that Slovenians will come back quickly with three easy goals by Cingesar and Marguc on 6:5 in 15th minute.
Slovenian defense raised level, but on the other side Vincent Gerrard didn’t allow rivals to turnover result. Finally, two goals by Valentin Porte forced Veselin Vujovic to take time-out on 9:6 in 19th minute.
Jure Dolenec and Vid Kavticnik put pressure on French guys with two goals for 10:8, but risky tactics on playing 7 on 6, gave chance host team to response with two goals on “empty goal” for 13:8. That was enough to leave the court on half-time break ahead of the rivals – 15:12.
Balkan team began to have problems with French defense, which kept Slovenian back-line far away from Gerrard’s net. It looked that resistance of the outsiders is over in 45th minute, when Veselin Vujovic called time-out on 25:19, but two goals in a row gave boost of energy to Slovenia – 25:21, with clear chance for Mackovsek to decrease on -3, but his former team-mate from Montpellier, Gerrard “read” his shot.
Nedim Remili woke up his team with two goals and that put pressure off. Five minutes before the end, Dinart called time-out on 28:24 after two goals of Slovenian “robot” Blaz Janc. Once again, Nedim Remili had no mercy for Slovenian goalkeepers and Marseillaise began…
