Handball: a record year for PSG in the Starligue

"Slam".

This word, which is defined as “a series of victories”, evokes many things for athletes.

With Roland-Garros last Sunday, Rafael Nadal has 22 to his name.

The French rugby team had a great success at the start of the year.

In handball, it designates a perfect season, without any defeat or draw.

All wins, no points left along the way.

If the feat has already been achieved abroad, notably in Spain and Germany, two other major handball countries, it had never been done in France.

Until Wednesday, when PSG made history after their ultimate success against Créteil, the 30th of the season.

Enormous.

It is done !

after this 38-33 success against Créteil, the Parisians achieve the PERFECT championship!

30 matches / 30 wins

What a run in such a tough championship!

BRAVO 🔴🔵 pic.twitter.com/yGsNA9CCBk

— PSG Handball (@psghand) June 8, 2022

“It's an evening that will remain etched in the history of French sport, reacted Jean-Claude Blanc, the Deputy General Manager of Paris Saint-Germain.

The performance of our team is a benchmark for current and future generations, as this record will be extremely difficult to equal.

It crowns all the talent and the requirement of a unique group, which registered Paris Saint-Germain in capital letters at the top of the prize list of French handball.

“At home, in front of their kop, the Parisians have been particularly intractable, with five of their six victories with at least 40 goals scored.

36.8 goals average per game

Logically, PSG finished with the best attack (1103 goals, new record, 36.8 average) and a goal average of +232.

It is also the only team to have exceeded the 1,000 goal mark in a season, like last year.

Les Parisiens have never scored less than 30 goals in a single game.

It is finally the 8th consecutive title (the 9th in all) for the club taken over by the Qataris in 2012. Montpellier, which holds the record with 14 trophies, has never done better than the pass of 5.

This feat is all the more significant as since 2020, the competition has taken place with 16 teams.

It's not nothing when the opponents who can claim the crown are legion: Montpellier, Nantes, Aix, and to a lesser degree Chambéry and Nîmes all want to bite into the cake.

The last defeat of the Karabatic brothers and their comrades in the league dates back to April 25, 2021, at home against Nantes (24-25), which had then put an end to the already PSG record (22 victories).

However, this is not the first time that a club has finished undefeated in a season.

USM Gagny (1987) and OM Vitrolles in 1996 with a certain Jackson Richardson had respectively dropped one and two draws en route (in 22 and 24 games).

Since then these two clubs have fallen into oblivion, the Marseillais of Jackson Richardson and Bruno Martini (former general manager of PSG and current president of the National Handball League) having even disappeared the year of his coronation.

In the ranking of the titles of champion of France, the club of the capital now occupies only 2nd place with nine trophies.

It is one of better than Ivry, one of the historic clubs of French handball, which will return to the Elite next season after a short passage in Proligue.

It will now be necessary for Paris to whip to join Montpellier (14 and no more than 5 consecutive) on the highest step.

In France, the slam is new and that's why it fascinates.

Abroad, there is a country where we are used to it.

With four consecutive Slams, from 2013 to 2017 (i.e. 118 matches), Barcelona is indeed the King of Spain, and Nikola Karabatic, who lived it for two seasons, knows something about it.

The only difference is that Barça has had no subjects at its height for a long time... In the other major leagues, Kiel has only won all of its matches in the Bundesliga once.

It was in 2011-2012, with 34 wins.

A real feat that Thierry Omeyer, the current manager of PSG, had experienced.

With 33 consecutive victories, the series is just waiting to be continued from the start of next season for PSG handball players.

For comparison, footballers who play a few hundred meters have made 36. It was between the 30th day of 2014-2015, and the 27th day of 2015-2016.

The two have one thing in common: they have never won the Champions League.

The most beautiful of trophies and much more than a record.