By Sports Reporter/Doha


Thierry Omeyer is our life insurance, when it counts.” That’s how Nikola Karabatic and every French player praised their goalkeeper after Omeyer’s extraordinary performance in their semi-final victory over Spain at the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship in Qatar on Friday night.
The 38-year-old goalkeeper saved 58% of all Spanish shots to secure the team’s spot in the final against tournament hosts Qatar by winning 26-22.
In 1999, Omeyer played his first international match for France; just two years later he became world champion for the first time.
Since then Omeyer has won all silverware a handball player can collect: in 2003 he took the EHF Champions League title for the first time with his former club Montpellier MAHB, in 2006 he transferred to German side THW Kiel and added three more Champions League trophies (2007, 2010 and 2012) and the IHF Super Globe title in 2011.
But by far his successes with the national team were more incredible. He was European champion in 2006, 2010, and 2014, Olympic champion in 2008 and 2012, and world champion in 2009 and 2011.
If France manage to beat Qatar tonight, Omeyer and his longtime teammate Jerome Fernandez would become the first male handball players to win their individual fourth World Championship.
“Thierry is always hungry to win. He never missed any important appointment, which means that he shows his best performances in crucial matches. Then he is simply unbeatable,” says Francois-Xavier Houlet, former Omeyer teammate on the national team and today a TV expert for host broadcaster beINsport.
The often praised goalkeeper fully agrees.
“I hate to lose,” Omeyer says. “The only one who is allowed to beat me is my daughter Manon, when we play cards.”
And Omeyer is full of adrenaline prior to the clash against Qatar, bearing in mind that France has never lost a final when he was between the goalposts. “I love those big games. I love when it counts.”
The critical role Omeyer plays for the French team is also proved by his individual merits. In 2008 he was awarded IHF World Handball Player of the Year, and was awarded best goalkeeper and All Star team member at the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games, the 2009 and 2011 World Championship and at the 2006 European Championship.
“To win the two Olympic finals were the greatest moments of my career,” Omeyer, nicknamed ‘Titi’, says.
But he also knows that victory is not only in the hands of the goalkeeper.
“We have the best defence in the world, I can fully rely on them as they can fully rely on me. It is the cooperation of goalkeeper and defence, which makes us so strong.”
In 2013 he left THW Kiel to return home, where it all started, transferring to Montpellier. But after only one season he joined Qatar-powered French top club Paris St-Germain.
If one thought that all his medals and trophies would be showcased in a cabinet, they’d be wrong.
“All those trophies are in a pasteboard. I am not the guy who must see them every day. If you just focus on those trophies you have won already, you lose the hunger for more.
“But I am still hungry for every new trophy, regardless how often I had won it. When I have ended my career I’ll have a lot of time to look at them.”