Paris (AFP)

According to the daily L'Equipe, Didier Dinart was dismissed from his duties as coach of the France team and would thus pay the fiasco of Euro-2020, where the French did not pass the first round.

Contacted by AFP, the French Handball Federation declined to comment, while Didier Dinart was not available in the evening on Sunday.

Dinart would have been informed Sunday of his sidelining and his replacement by his assistant Guillaume Gille from the Olympic qualification tournament in Paris (April 17-19), says L'Equipe.

The national technical director of the French hand, Philippe Bana, had however dismissed what he presented as a "somewhat easy idea which would consist in saying that the coaches are kleenex rather than good wines", in the aftermath of the French defeat against Norway, synonymous with unprecedented elimination of the Euro even before the main round.

"It is a collective failure that we all assume," he added.

In mid-April, the French will have to take one of the first two places of an Olympic qualification tournament (TQO) with Croatia, vice-champion of Europe 2020, Portugal, who beat them at the opening of the 'Euro-2020, and Tunisia, vice-champion of Africa 2020.

Failure to qualify for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics would be a huge snub, while the French, double Olympic champions (2008, 2012) and still silver medalists in 2016 in Rio, have always participated in the Games since their breakthrough on the international scene in Barcelona in 1992 with the "Bronzés".

- Successor of Onesta -

Didier Dinart arrived at the head of the Blues at the end of September 2016, after having been placed on the front of the stage as assistant during Euro-2016 (5th) and the JO-2016, with Claude Onesta in the role of coach.

His first competition as boss of the Blues, with Guillaume Gille as assistant, took place ideally with a sixth title of world champion, conquered at home in the lair of Paris-Bercy, already the place of the planetary coronation of 2001 .

This coronation had allowed the Guadeloupean, patron of French defense when he was a player, to assert himself at the head of the Blues, with the heavy burden of succeeding coach Claude Onesta, the man who carried French handball to the top and who still occupied the role of general manager at the time of the Mondial-2017.

But since then, Dinart's position has gradually eroded: the two heavy losses in the semi-finals of Euro-2018 against Spain (27-23) and of the World Cup-2019 against Denmark (the two future winners) asked about the ability of the French to raise their level as they have done for years.

The French dominated European and world handball over the decade between 2006 and 2017: four titles of world champions (2009, 2011, 2015, 2017), two Olympic titles (2008, 2012), and three European titles (2006, 2010 , 2014).

But in recent years, France's place in the world hierarchy has slowly eroded, with bronze medals at the European Championship in 2018 and at the World Cup in 2019, then a 14th place at Euro-2020.

The unexpected setback against Portugal (33-27) in the qualification phase for Euro-2020 at Guimaraes in April 2019 looked like a mishap, but it was confirmed in Norway in the first game of the Blues at the 'Euro-2020 (28-25), reinforcing this impression of decline.

© 2020 AFP