TEHRAN, 20 June (BelTA - IRNA). - Iran teen-aged beach handball team beat France on Sunday evening in Beach Handball World Cup to win Iran's 1st handball medal in a world competition.
The Iranian youth in their competition for the third place versus France gained the 2-nil result to win the bronze medal, which is Iran's first ever in this field.
Iran was ahead in the first half of the game 20-16, and in the second half the two teams were quite close to each other and ended 19-18 in Iran's favor, which made Iran win 2-0 the match and the medal.
The Iranian youth's bronze medal in a world competition thus made history, as it is Iranian handball's first ever medal in such scenes.
The Iranian beach youth handball team had earlier in their group beat the United States and Qatar, and lost to Sweden, to reach the second round of the games among the 12 top teams.
There, too, they beat Brazil and France, but lost to Croatia to rise to the quarter final. In the quarter final they beat Argentina and made history by reaching the semifinal.
In the semifinal their bad luck lead to their loss in their second match versus Brazil, but in their fight for the bronze medal they did excellent.
