William Gérald Accambray (born 8 April 1988) is a French

handball Handball (also known as team handball, European handball, Olympic handball or indoor handball) is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each (six outcourt players and a goalkeeper) pass a ball using their hands with the aim of thr ...

player who plays for Saran Loiret Handball and for the French national team. With the French national team, he is a three time world champion, in

2011 The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...

2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...

and

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

. He is the son of hammer thrower

Jacques Accambray Jacques Accambray (born 23 May 1950) is a French former track and field athlete. A talented age group thrower, Accambray set a world junior record in men's hammer throw in 1969. During the early 1970s he studied at Kent State University in Ohio, ...

and Isabelle Accambray.

Career

Accambray started playing handball at the age of 6 at ASPTT Grasse. At 14 he joined Handball Mougins Mouans-Sartoux. A year later he joined Mandelieu HB. His professional career started at HB Mougins Mouans-Sartoux Mandelieu in the French second tier. In 2008 he joined top flight team

Montpellier HB Montpellier Handball, formerly named Montpellier Agglomération Handball, is a professional handball club from Montpellier, France. Montpellier is the only French club to ever have won the EHF Champions League. History The team was founded as ...

. In the 2010-11 season he was named the best player in the Division 1. In the 2011-12 season he extended his contract with Montpellier until 2016. In 2014 he joined league rivals

Paris Saint-Germain Paris Saint-Germain Football Club, commonly referred to as Paris Saint-Germain () or simply PSG, is a French professional Association football, football club based in Paris. They compete in Ligue 1, the French football league system, top d ...

together with

Thierry Omeyer Thierry Omeyer (born 2 November 1976) is a retired French handball goalkeeper. A member of the French national team since 1999, he has won all major titles with the team: world champion (five times), European champion (three times) and Olympic ...

. In 2017 he joined Hungarian

KC Veszprém KC, Kc and similar may refer to: Places * Kuçovë District, Albania's ISO 3166-2 code * Kansas City metropolitan area, a major metropolitan area of the United States ** Kansas City, Missouri, its principal city ** Kansas City, Kansas, the third-l ...

. From October 2018 until the end of the 2018-19 season he was loaned to Slovenian

RK Celje Rokometni klub Celje () or simply RK Celje, currently named Celje Pivovarna Laško () due to sponsorship reasons, is a professional handball club from Celje, Slovenia. They were the winners of the Champions League in the 2003–04 season, beco ...

. Afterwards he joined Belarussian team

HC Meshkov Brest HC Meshkov Brest (Myashkov Brest, officially A. P. Myashkow Brest Handball Club, ) is a professional handball club from Brest, Belarus. They currently compete in the Belarusian First League of Handball, in the SEHA League and competed in the E ...

. After a year in Belarus he returned to France to join

Pays d'Aix UC In France, a ''pays'' () is an area whose inhabitants share common geographical, economic, cultural, or social interests, who have a right to enter into communal planning contracts under a law known as the Loi Pasqua or LOADT (''Loi d'Orientation ...

. In 2023 he joined Saran Loiret Handball.

National team

Accambray debuted for the French national team on 19 May 2009 against Portugal. His first medal for France was at the 2009 Mediterranean Games in Pescara. A year later he won the 2010 European Championship in Austria. In 2011 he won the 2011 World Championship beating Denmark in the final. At the

2012 Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012, were an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

he won gold medals with the French team. In 2014 he won the

European Championship A European Championship is the top level international sports competition between European athletes or sports teams representing their respective countries or professional sports clubs. In the plural, the European Championships also refers t ...

for a second time, and in 2015 he won the

World Championship A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

for a second time. His third world championship came in

Achievements

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games (Olympics; ) are the world's preeminent international Olympic sports, sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a Multi-s ...

: **''Winner'': 2012 *

: **''Winner'': 2011, 2015, 2014 *

: **''Winner'': 2010, 2014 *

LNH Division 1 LNH Division 1, doing business as Starligue and currently known as Liqui Moly Starligue for sponsorship reasons, is the premier men's professional handball league in France. It is administered by the Ligue Nationale de Handball, under delegatio ...

: **''Winner'': 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 *

Coupe de France The Coupe de France (), also known in English language, English as the French Cup or less commonly as the France Cup, is the premier Single-elimination tournament, knockout cup competition in French football organised by the French Football Fed ...

: **''Winner'': 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2012 * Belarussian championship: **''Winner'': 2020

References

External links

Profile at Montpellier Agglomération Handball official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Accambray, William 1988 births Living people Sportspeople from Cannes French male handball players Handball players at the 2012 Summer Olympics Olympic handball players for France Olympic gold medalists for France Olympic medalists in handball Medalists at the 2012 Summer Olympics European champions for France French expatriate handball players in Hungary French expatriate sportspeople in Slovenia Handball players at the 2009 Mediterranean Games Mediterranean Games silver medalists for France Mediterranean Games medalists in handball 21st-century French sportsmen Montpellier Handball players French expatriate sportspeople in Belarus Paris Saint-Germain Handball players