Siraba Dembele and Les Bleues can double -
Henning Bagger / AP / SIPA
The mega tile.
Three months before the Tokyo Olympics, the French women's handball team lost its captain Siraba Dembélé to injury.
The latter suffers from a complete rupture of the Achilles tendon and will not be back in time to play the Olympics, the French Federation announced on Tuesday.
Sunday in the quarterfinals second leg of the Champions League with his club Bucharest, Siraba Dembélé was injured in the final action.
Additional medical examinations carried out on Tuesday revealed a complete rupture of the right Achilles tendon, synonymous with the end of the season for the leader of the France team.
The operation is scheduled for Wednesday, then will follow a long process of rehabilitation.
“This injury necessarily falls at the least ideal time.
It was to be my last competition with the France team and it's hard to swallow, ”responded Sira (34) quoted in the FFHandball press release.
“It was a continuation of what we've been going through together for almost five years and it's hard not to end this cycle with them.
You have to accept it, it's part of the game. "
A challenge for Krumbholz
A little more than three months before the opening of the 2020 Olympics, where the French handball players will be contenders for Olympic gold, it is a blow for the coach Olivier Krumbholz, who loses the leader of the team. of France in recent years.
"There is a kind of challenge for the team to function without it, but if everyone gives the best of themselves, we must be able to find our cohesion, with the spirit of what Siraba had set up" , estimated the coach.
He also wished her good rehabilitation, "because there are longer-term issues for her, with a second career and a second life where her physical integrity will be just as important".
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