Norway accounted for one of the most powerful picks ever when they defeated France 29-22 in the World Cup final and won the gold.
Afterwards, the award ceremony took place.
And it ended in crash.
The president of the International Handball Federation, Hassan Moustafa, gave a speech that began, to say the least, tentatively.
He cautiously named this year's World Cup as the 25th and then took a sudden break.
After a slight moment of flipping through the papers, he could, to the cheers of the audience, say:
"Then we can confirm that Norway is the world champion," said Moustafa.
"I do not understand"
Then it continued with a big miss.
- And Denmark in second place.
The cheers in the stands were exchanged for anger and cries erupted.
The reason?
As mentioned, France lost the World Cup final and thus came second.
But the president's failure did not end there, as he did not realize his mistake.
- And France in third place.
Congratulations to the countries and good luck to the rest of the teams in the next world championship.
Mustafa's colleagues tried to point out the error, but without success.
"I do not understand," he said.
Aroused great anger
Dissatisfaction with the incident has been clear in France.
- In my opinion, it is totally disrespectful to France.
What more can I say?
Do you think it is normal for the IHF president not to know who finished second immediately after the final has been played, says the French national team player Beatrice Edwige to Danish TV2.
CLIP: Norway won the World Handball Championship after France collapsed (December 19, 2021)
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The World Cup gold in handball is Norway's after France collapsed in the final.
Photo: TT