Olympic Highlights Day 15: Handball, football & basketball throw up epic finals
Handball
Women's final: Norway vs France
15:00 CET - Lille, Stade Pierre-Mauroy
This match will not be played in Paris, but in Lille in the backdrop of a football arena, and again a crowd of around 27,000 is expected. It will be a clash between two teams that met in the final of the last World Cup.
France boast the title of world champions and are defending their gold from Tokyo. But in the semi-final match of the Olympic tournament, they were up against it.
The home side were losing almost the entire match against Sweden, and it was only at 21-17 that Tamara Horacek took the match into her own hands. She erased the deficit with four goals in the end and scored the last one 15 seconds before the end of the game and the game went into overtime at 25-25.
Although Norway lost the Nordic derby to Sweden at the start of the tournament, they have gone through to the final in perfect fashion and, apart from the first game, were only down for nine minutes in the whole tournament.
Norway have the best defence of the tournament, conceding an average of only 20.85 goals per game. France, on the other hand, has the best offense, scoring an average of more than 30 goals (30.14).
Football
Women's final: Brazil vs USA
17:00 CET - Paris, Parc des Princes
It's the third time the USA and Brazil face each other in the Olympic women's football final. In Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008, the American women won gold, and the overall match record is also clearly in favour of the US team, who have won 32 of their 40 matches. Brazil have beaten the USA only three times.
Their paths to the finals also suggest who is the favourite. The USA went through the group stage without dropping a point and only conceded twice in five matches. The Brazilians, on the other hand, only made the playoffs from third place.
However, Brazil then managed to knock out the hosts France and beat the world champions Spain 4-2 in a fantastic semi-final. Brazil have two silver medals in their history but the events of the last week suggest that the team is determined to finally win gold at the third attempt. Gabi Portillo is especially in form, with a goal in the quarter-finals against France, and a goal and assist in the semi-final.
Basketball
Men's final: USA vs France
21:30 CET - Paris, Bercy Hall
This is definitely a dream final for the host nation and a rematch of the Tokyo gold medal fight. Then, the Americans took the gold after an 87-82 victory. It was their fourth Olympic title in a row, and they are looking for a fifth in Paris.
LeBron James accepted the offer to play for the USA as his career winds down. He was last at the London 2012 Olympics and is playing for his third Olympic victory. However, the Americans owe their advancement to the gold medal match mainly to captain Steph Curry, who was able to turn the tide for his team with his three-pointers in the final stages of the semi-final game against Serbia (95-91). The Americans were down by 17 points before turning it around.
Now comes the next challenge: host country France, who knocked out reigning world champions Germany (73-69) and will be driven by a boisterous home crowd. Although the French were looking a bit shaky at the start of the Olympic tournament, the team has come together over time and has not allowed any wavering from the regular group in the playoffs.
France's first tough test in the quarter-finals against Canada (82-73) was driven by the players playing in the European leagues. Guerschon Yabusele of Real Madrid and Isaia Cordinier of Virtus Bologna were out of the starting line-up at the start of the tournament, but coach Vincent Collet was starting to rely on them more and more in the knockout fights. But, of course, the hero for the fans is the NBA's previous number-one draft pick Victor Wembanyama, who at 20 years old will already have one of the most memorable moments of his career.