Spain have lost their chance to defend their title, while France are one step closer to repeating their feat of holding all three major handball titles at once after they defeated the 2013 World Champions in a low-scoring battle testament to the performance of both goalkeepers. 

Spain-France 22:26 (14:18)

From the first goal it was evident this was going to be a spectacular game between two high-class sides. 

Joan Canellas was the first to put a point on the board, but France quickly followed and it was not long before the European and Olympic champions took the lead. 

It was all about France in the first half. Fifteen minutes in they had created a five goal lead (7:12) under the expert direction of Nikola Karabatic in centre back, with goals already scored from every position. 

France’s defence gave Spain a lot of trouble – Luka Karabatic came in as a defensive specialist in place of his brother for the first third of the match and quickly found a way to shut down vital Canellas almost completely. 

France’s defence was too good at forcing Spain to work in only a small part of the court, and the Spanish attack really began to crumble after 20 minutes of play. 

A big French presence in the arena buoyed Les Bleus on as they held on to take a four-goal advantage into the break.  

The second half started slowly for both sides. Neither side hit the back of the net until a Cristian Ugalde fast break in the fourth minute, which was quickly followed by another from the same (16:18).

France scored only one goal until almost midway through the second period, while Spain slowly closed the gap to 18:19 in the 37th.

But Spain soon joined the drought and the score stayed where it was until a Cedric Sourhaindo goal in the 43rd minute, with no goal at all for five minutes. 

Young Spanish goalkeeper Gonzalo Perez De Vargas played an exceptional second half after a quiet first one.

With Omeyer putting on an even more spectacular show (48% save rate), saving several Spanish penalty shots, the half was kept very low scoring. In the 17th minute the score for the period was just 4:3. 

At the 51 minute mark France held a two-goal lead (21:23), which they retained with five minutes remaining (22:24). 

Spain switched to 5-1 to mark out Nikola Karabatic as both sides continued the struggle to get the ball past the keeper. 

After another scoring drought, Michael Guigou scored France’s two last goals to put the score at 22:26 as the final 30 seconds commenced, and the French fans in Lusail began to celebrate. 

"We fought incredibly well and played a very strong first half. To score 18 goals against one of the best defences at this tournament is a good performance. We were in the lead by four goals but we did had some problems with our attack that we had to compensate for by continuing to fight in the defence. Moreover, Thierry Omeyer had great saves and that helped a lot to win this match. I am really proud of our whole team," said Daniel Narcisse to summarise the match.

According to Spain left wing Valero Rivera, Omeyer was the key to France's victory:

"It was a very difficult game for us and France was better in defence. It tells you a lot about a match when the goalkeeper is the MVP. In the first half we did not close our wall well enough and they took revenge."

Omeyer’s performance earned him the adidas Man of the Match award.