He almost never flew with the French team to compete in the European Handball Championship in Germany. He was one of three players not selected at the end of the preparation course for the competition.
But ultimately, Benoît Kounkoud (26 years old) was called at the last minute by coach Guillaume Gille, to compensate for the injury of Yanis Lenne, victim of lower back pain.
The rest, we know it. The euphoria of the victory, Sunday January 28, in the final once morest Denmark, quickly gave way to astonishment when we learned, Wednesday morning, that the right winger had been arrested during the night of Monday to Tuesday and placed and police custody for suspicion of attempted rape of a 20-year-old young woman, in a nightclub in the 18th arrondissement of Paris.
A checkered career
The career of this man originally from Reunion but born in Chesnay (Yvelines) began in the mid-2010s follows a sinusoidal curve, made of ups but also downs. Promising beginnings with PSG Handball which welcomed him following his departure from his native island in 2014 and also in the French youth team with a gold medal at the European Under-20 Championship in 2014 then the World Championship the following year in 2015. He started with the seniors during Euro 2016 which left a bitter taste for the Blues, finishing in fifth place.
As an individual, Kounkoud then begins to multiply his injuries. He is absent from the national teams until Euro 2022 where France finishes fourth. That year, he also left PSG for Polish club Kielce. He saw this last minute selection for the Euro as a possibility of also playing the Olympic Games in Paris this summer. Renowned as an “ambience driver”, according to The Parisianthe left-hander will have to face a new stage in his career, he who emerged free from police custody on Wednesday January 31 at the end of the day.
