Europe 1 with AFP 9:54 p.m., January 10, 2023

The title and nothing else.

After the frustrating fourth place won at Euro 2022, the French men's handball team approaches, from Wednesday at 9 p.m. in Katowice against the Polish host, the World Cup with the stated objective of bringing back a planetary coronation who has been running away from her for six years.

Third in the 2019 edition, at the foot of the podium in the next one, in 2021 in the Egyptian health bubble, the Blues intend to sew a seventh world star on the jersey during the world championships in Poland which begin this Wednesday.

Nikola Karabatic's teammates intend to announce the color a year and a half before the Paris Games where they will have to defend the title acquired in Tokyo in the summer of 2021, Guillaume Gille's first coronation as coach.

The Blues want the double on the roof of the world, on January 29 in Stockholm in this World Cup organized by Poland and Sweden.

"We are aiming for victory. But everything remains to be done, to write, the path that awaits us is going to be damn arduous and also super exciting", launches the former center half of France, the most successful nation in the competition (six coronations ).

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A "Saucer" to take off

This long road, in a competition with 32 teams, which will leave only one per pool at the end of the first round, will begin with the toughest opponent: Poland, in the "Spodek" (" Saucer" in Polish) from Katowice (south), filled with some 11,000 spectators heated to white and red.

A nation which has not finished in the top 8 of an international competition since 2016 and deprived of its best player, the pivot of Paris SG Kamil Syprzak, through injury.

But who will have, according to Gille, the "hairs bristling to the ceiling".

"(The Poles) have been talking about it for a long time. They have all been together in the national team since December 16, and others had even arrived before. They have since just had the December 24, 25 and 26 cut off, and have already done six or seven preparation matches" underlines the pivot Nicolas Tournat, who plays in Kielce, the great Polish club.

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Scandinavian competition

The Blues, then opposed to Saudi Arabia (Saturday) and Slovenia (Monday), only had two trial runs to break in.

They convinced (43-32 against the Netherlands and 33-32 against Egypt, candidate for the world podium) and seem to arrive launched towards this meeting already crucial for the rest of the course since the points acquired in the first round against qualified teams will be retained in the main round for the quarter-finals.

The France team had reached the last four during the last Euro, in January 2022 in Hungary, when it had been deprived, due to the health crisis, of its last two preparation matches, and of several executive players, packages, including Luka Karabatic, cornerstone of the defense and then named new captain, in the fall of 2022.

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A few absent

For this World Cup, the Blues also deplore a few absentees (Nguessan, Descat, Kounkoud, Minne, Konan) but are also counting on the young generation, led by left-backs Thibaud Briet and Elohim Prandi, and left winger Dylan Nahi, to dethrone the Danes, double defending champions.

The team led by Mikkel Hansen will once again be one of the big favourites.

With Sweden center-half Jim Gottfridsson, reigning European champion and at home, even if it will be deprived of its star right-back, former Montpellier player Karl Wallinius, through injury.

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The Covid, "sword of Damocles"

To cap a seventh world crown, the Blues will also have to avoid the Covid pitfall.

Compared to Euro 2022, the protocol has been relaxed, but the International Federation nevertheless requires a negative PCR test before the first round (presented by all French people), the main round and any quarter-finals.

And any positive player will be sidelined for a minimum of five days.

This regulation, established when no health bubble has been put in place, makes the Blues cringe (like other selections), aware according to Gille that a "sword of Damocles will necessarily be present" above 'them.