Denmark vs Spain.
Photo: PL

Havana, January 28 (RHC)-- Denmark will seek its third consecutive title in the men's handball World Championship on Sunday, after beating Spain 26-23 in the semifinals of the Poland-Sweden 2023 event.

The Danes, crowned at the 2019 and 2021 universal jousts, will try to win the crown for the third time and will do so against the French, who beat the Swedes 31-26 in the other semifinal.

Simon Bogetoft Pytlick led the French offense with six goals, seconded by Magnus Saugstrup (five) and Mikkel Hansen (four).

For the losers, Alex Dujshebaev scored five goals, Ferrán Sole (four) and Ángel Fernández and Abel Serdio (three).

This is the third time that the holders have beaten the Spaniards in four consecutive meetings in the semifinals of a major competition.

The previous two occurred at the World Cup-2021 (36-33) and at the Tokyo-2020 Olympic Games -postponed to 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic- (27-23), although Spain beat Denmark in the semifinals of the European tournament in 2022 (29-25).

The Iberian team will now be aiming for the bronze medal, as in the previous world championship. However, they will not be able to win their third world championship after 2005 and 2013.

In the second semifinal, France silenced the crowd in the Stockholm Pavilion with a 31-26 win over Sweden, the reigning European champions.

Les Bleus, six-time monarchs of the planet, will contest their first World Cup final since the edition they won on home soil in 2017, plus the Gauls already defeated the Swedes in the semifinals of the 2021 orb event and the 2022 European Championship.

"We feel not only relief, but a real emotion, joy, for having responded in this match that was not at all easy with this context. We are very satisfied to have beaten Sweden and to be able to aspire to another star on Sunday against Denmark," said French coach Guillaume Gille.