By Yash Mudgal/Doha


Olympic Champions France and two-time runners-up Denmark entered the quarterfinals of the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship yesterday.
France defeated Argentina 33-20 at Ali Bin Hamad Al Attiya Arena, while Denmark defeated Iceland 30-25 at Lusail Multipurpose Hall.
France probably played their best first half in the tournament so far against Argentina. French goalkeeper Thierry Omeyer once again proved what a key factor he is and has been in all major successes of the reigning Olympic and European champions.
After 30 minutes, ‘Titi’ had a save percentage of 60, putting pressure on the Argentinian gunners who had underlined their quality in the clashes against strong European sides like Denmark, Poland and Russia in the group stages.
Energy and courage of the Sebastian and Diego, Juan Pablo Fernandez, Federico Vieyra and other South Americans was simply not at par with the French ‘experts’.
The Argentinians scored their fourth goal in the 21st minute, trailing Claude Onesta’s boys by six goals at 10-4.
The successful French coach Onesta, who is going for his third World Championship gold after 2009 and 2011, let a majority of his players play today, given his confidence in the half-time score of 16-6.
Argentina had to wait till the 43rd minute for their 10th goal (23-10). Five minutes before the final whistle, France was leading by 15 goals (31-16).
Valentin Porte with 6 goals was the top-scorer of the winning team, while Gonzalo Carou netted one less for Argentina.
The Danes, who are poised to end their World Cup gold medal drought, got off to a good start and were up 5-0 after only six minutes.
The Danish defence was extremely solid in front of a well-playing Niklas Landin in goal, and consequently the counter-attacks rolled successful towards the Icelandic goal.
It took Iceland seven minutes to get their first goal.
Iceland played without their playmaker Aron Palmarsson, who had suffered from brain concussion, but that was far from enough to explain the huge performance gap between the two teams.
Iceland tried a man to man defence against Mikkel Hansen, but that did not help much either, and they soon abandoned the idea.
Right back Alexander Petersson was the only real Icelandic threat against the Danish defence in the first half, while Bjorgvin Pall Gustavsson in goal did his best to keep the Danish score down with a good performance.
Pettersson scored seven times for Iceland, while playmaker Rasmus Lauge Schmidt pumped in six goals for Denmark.
The Danes have been among the top teams in the world for the past 12 years or so, racking up six European Championship medals (two golds, a silver and three bronzes), but so far the World Championship title has remained elusive. They finished third in 2007 before losing two consecutive finals in 2011 and 2013. They will play defending champions Spain in quarters, while France will meet Slovenia.

Yesterday’s results (Last 16)
Germany 23 Egypt 16
Poland 24 Sweden 20
Iceland 25 Denmark 30
France 33 Argentina 20

Wednesday’s quarter-finals
Croatia v Poland
Qatar v Germany
Denmark v Spain
Slovenia v France