The first time Olivier Krumbholz sat on the bench of Les Bleues, France was not yet world football champion.
It was in Toulouse on February 11, 1998 a few months before the World Cup in France.
The day when Lorrain took over as coach, succeeding Carole Martin, the French women's hand team was not much, just a second division team on the world stage.
“It was a qualifying group match for Euro 1998 with Spain, Lithuania and Norway, remembers the man with 500 caps on the French federation website.
I remember that on the day of the match, the doctor came to tell me:
your captain has put a product in his nose that he shouldn't have: she can't play.
It was Catherine Pibarot who later met a tragic fate (she died in 2010 in a climbing accident in Drôme).
I did not have my captain for the first game, which was difficult to win (24-23).
Euro 1998 is the only competition for which we did not qualify.
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315 wins in 499 games
It's been better since.
After the quack of the beginnings, the dean of the breeders at the planetary level accompanied the French hand at the top of the world.
315 wins, 162 losses, 22 draws;
an Olympic title (2021), two world (2003, 2017) and a European (2018);
13 international medals won in 26 competitions.
Here is his balance sheet in numbers.
“The title that marked me the most is necessarily the first (world in 2003), says the Lorrain.
When you then know the course of the French team and even mine with a few selections for the France team, I could hardly imagine that career.
The one that represents the most plenitude is that of the Olympic Games.
Beat the Netherlands by ten goals in the quarter-finals (32-22), when we were not on a particularly brilliant course until then, then behind,
mastering the final against the Russians was remarkable.
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SEMI-FINAL DAY!
🇳🇴⚡🇫🇷
🤾♀️ #NORFRA
⏰ 20:30
📺 BeIn Sports |
TFX
📱 #BleuetFier
Les BLEUES are at the gates of the final!
Go BLUE 💙🤍❤️ pic.twitter.com/dUXCJngZXB
– French Handball Teams (@FRAHandball) November 18, 2022
In 25 years of career, the 64-year-old coach who will end his career after Paris 2024 has gone through moments of disappointment, anger and sadness: "The biggest trauma is for sure fourth place at the Athens Olympics in 2004 where I think the bronze medal was reaching out to us," he said.
We did not manage to get it against Ukraine.
It was a very big disappointment.
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But not the worst memory: “At the 2007 World Cup, at Bercy, it was the defeat in the quarter against Romania (31-34 ap).
It was terrible.
This is the worst moment of my career.
The room was full, my whole family was there, my children, who were small, were crying.
“It was at Bercy, 11 years later, that he also experienced ecstasy: “Behind, when we return to Bercy in 2018 in this room where the boys have won everything, it weighs on us.
We are until then the lame duck of the house.
If we lose that day, we will still say that the French women's team is the by-product of the boys.
We organize the World Cup for the boys and they win.
Fortunately, we are doing the same for the girls with Euro 2018. That too was a very good moment.
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His greatest anger, his greatest joys
Sanguine, Krumbholz who left his place between 2013 and early 2016 to Alain Portes, has long been known for his (very) big anger.
"There were a few," he admits.
I remember my anger and bitterness at the end of the match for third place in Athens.
I did all the assessment of the Olympics in the locker room because after everyone perfect.
Although I think I was right but now was not the time.
I won't do that today.
My greatest moments of doubt date from the period of reconstruction after these Games.
We changed a lot of players.
At the World Cup in Russia in 2005, we finished in twelfth place after a monumental jerk against Brazil (35-23).
In one room, there were two French supporters and no one else.
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No, the path has not always been quiet: “There were indeed special moments, continues the boss of the Blue on the federal site.
The trip that marked me the most was during the summer of 2016. We were going to prepare for the Olympic Games in Norway and we missed the match in Oslo.
We find ourselves taking another plane to reach Ulsteinvik which will require several hours by bus.
We take several ferries to cross the fjords.
It's a summer night with the sun rising over the sea, it was beautiful.
It was perhaps one of the unifying elements of the team.
It was a very special moment when the beauty of the sites led us towards a certain form of philosophy.
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This Friday evening, Olivier Krumbholz will therefore don the costume for the 500th time, against his favorite opponent, Norway.
“This match will be full of emotions, slips Béatrice Edwige.
I hope we will give him the best of gifts.
A qualification for the final of the Euro would be perfect.
“It's dizzying and above all a great pleasure to make this 500th match in these conditions, on a match of such importance and against Norway, slips the Lorrain.
The main thing was to qualify for the last four, which was done and done well.
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