Katrine Lunde
Thierry Omeyer
Stat by stat
Bars are scaled to the leader in this list.
The verdict
Katrine Lunde leads 4 of 5 categories. Our all-time ranking places Katrine Lunde at #4 and Thierry Omeyer at #7.
The case for Katrine Lunde
The most decorated goalkeeper in handball and, by trophy count, arguably the most decorated player of any kind. Lunde won Olympic gold with Norway in 2008, 2012 and 2024, and took a medal at five consecutive Games from Beijing to Paris, where she played the final at 44. She has three world titles, in 2011, 2015 and 2021, and a stack of European Championships from the Norwegian dynasty that has now won a record ten EHF Euro crowns. At club level she won the Champions League seven times with three different employers: Viborg in 2009 and 2010, Gyor in 2013 and 2014, and Vipers Kristiansand in 2021, 2022 and 2023. Her method is positional rather than acrobatic - she reads the shooter's hips, plants early and takes up an enormous amount of visual space - and her record in 7-metre duels has decided finals for two decades. Her twin sister Kristine played alongside her for Norway.
The case for Thierry Omeyer
Routinely named by his peers as the best goalkeeper the sport has had, and the spine of the most successful national team ever assembled. Omeyer won Olympic gold in 2008 and 2012 and silver in 2016, four world titles with France (2009, 2011, 2015 and 2017) and three European Championships (2006, 2010 and 2014), and was IHF World Player of the Year in 2008, an award goalkeepers almost never win. At club level he took the Champions League four times, once with Montpellier and three times with THW Kiel, including the 2011-12 season in which Kiel won all 34 of their Bundesliga matches. His method was minimalist: a low, wide stance, almost no early commitment, and a willingness to leave one corner visible in order to invite the shot he had prepared for. He regularly finished major tournaments with save rates near forty percent, the informal threshold that separates a very good goalkeeper from a tournament-winning one.