Will Croatia need another miracle in Zagreb to beat France?

History tends to repeat in sports, not least in handball, and 2025 is no different.

At the same arena in Zagreb, France and Croatia both meet again in a knock-out game as the two handball titans go up against each other in their 2025 IHF Men’s World Championship semi-final

SEMI-FINAL
21:00 CET France vs Croatia

France come into this last four clash as firm favourites having won seven games in a row at the 2025 IHF Men’s World Championship, while Croatia have lost once (against Egypt) and have a catalogue of injuries, their coach Dagur Sigurdsson saying he could not give any updates on his walking wounded at his pre-match media conference as it was on an “hour-by-hour” basis.

“There is no player who does not complain about minor or serious injuries – arms, legs, muscles, calves,” said the Croatian Handball Federation website hrs.hr about the current state of their squad. 

Domagoj Duvnjak, Ivan Martinović, Filip Glavaš and Zvonimir Srna are all nursing injuries, but have been featuring on the court in the last matches. Marko Mamić also had suffered with a virus, but should be fit, up and running for the biggest match in Croatian handball over the last years.

Both teams came into the last four with last-second victories in their respective quarter-finals, France relying on their veteran Luka Karabatic to sink home from a restart against Egypt with 0.03 remaining on the game clock, while Marin Sipic struck from the line with one second remaining against Hungary to send 15,600 home fans delirious in their last eight match.

These two teams have met in the Arena Zagreb a number of times, with the 2009 IHF Men’s World Championship final the most memorable. 

France coach Guillaume Gille was in that gold medal-winning French team on that day as they turned around a 22:19 main round loss into a 24:19 final win.

Quite incredibly, Croatia’s captain Domagoj Duvnjak is still playing in 2025, having scored twice in the final 16 years ago, but his time is limited to less than a few minutes for each match due to a calf injury which sees their legendary player hardly able to walk at times.

But with the playmaker announcing he would retire from international duty after this tournament it is no surprise he is giving it his all. 

Croatia goalkeeper Ivan Pesic was part of that 2009 squad, but did not feature in the final and 16 years later he is convinced the crowd can help push them to a guaranteed medal in Oslo as they bid farewell to the Croatia-hosted part of their championship.

“In 2009 we had a very good team and, now, we also have a very good team,” he said. “But in 2009 everybody expected a medal and this time a lot of people don't, they didn't believe we can play in the semi-final. But this team, with a lot of injuries, with a lot of problems, rose and now we are playing in the semi-final. I think people now believe and will do, maybe, a better atmosphere than 2009.”

The two teams also met in the same arena at the 2018 European Championship, with France winning again (30:27). Away from Zagreb, France have most recently beaten Croatia in the main round of the 2024 European Championship a year ago (34:32) and in France last July (31:26) in a Paris 2024 Olympic Games warm-up.

"The next game against Croatia will be hell for us. They are playing better and better, I think they have reached a really high level now and it will be very difficult for us. We will have to be as calm as possible, try to keep a cool head and we expect a great fight. Of all the sounds on the court, we only heard our fans against Egypt, and we managed to concentrate on them and what was on the court. But I am sure that in the next game the fan atmosphere will be different," said France's hero in the win against Egypt, Luka Karabatic.

Top-scorers for the sides are Filip Glavas (Croatia) with 34 goals and Dika Mem (France), who sits on 42 goals, while ffhandball.fr reports that both Ludovic Fabregas (396 goals) and Dika Mem (495) could reach milestones in their national team goalscoring records.

Overall, they have played 37 times with France taking 22 wins, Croatia 14 wins and one draw.