The year 2024 has just ended, marking the end of a remarkably rich period, highlighted by annual events such as Roland-Garros and the Tour de France, as well as Euro 2024 and, notably, the Olympic Games from Paris.
What will the sporting world look like in 2025? With the World Handball Championship starting in January, the Women’s Euros in July, and the World Athletics Championships scheduled for September, many questions arise as we approach 2025. Here are just a few.
Since 2017, it has been eight years since the French team won the world champion title. A long time for the Blues, who were almost always at the top, securing four world titles in five tournaments between 2009 and 2017. As reigning European champions, the French team had a disappointing exit in 2024 , losing in the quarter-finals of the Paris Olympic Games.
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From January 14, the Blues will begin a new chapter without the retired Nikola Karabatic during the World Championship which takes place in Croatia, Denmark and Norway. They will face a relatively easy preliminary group, consisting of Austria, Qatar and Kuwait. Will they seize the opportunity to win their seventh world title?
What remains to be accomplished for Novak Djokovic? Not much, it seems. By winning gold at the Olympic Games, the 37-year-old Serbian captured the last major title missing from his illustrious career, betting his entire season on it.
For the first time since 2017, he finished the year without a Grand Slam title and remains tied at 24 with Margaret Smith Court. Now coached by Andy Murray, will Djokovic become the sole record holder for both men and women after the Australian Open, a tournament he has won a record ten times, starting on January 12?
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There is definitely a French rugby team with and without him. Antoine Dupont, who is pursuing his Olympic dream with the men’s rugby sevens team, returned to his roots with the French XV during the fall tour, securing three victories.
At the top of his game, whether in blue or with Stade Toulousain, the scrum-half will start on January 31 against Wales, aiming for his goal for 2025: the Six Nations Tournament. Can he lead the Blues to their second Grand Slam title after that of 2022?
Will he finally succeed in accomplishing it? After joining Real Madrid this summer, Kylian Mbappé put all the chances on his side to win his first Champions League title. Although his start to the season was difficult due to injuries, adaptation issues and lack of confidence, the French star ended 2024 on a positive note, offering hope for a second half of the season much more solid.
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Before he can solidify his position as a central figure at the Bernabéu until they lift the C1 title? Maybe, but getting a place in the play-offs will be crucial, as Real Madrid finds itself in 20th place on January 1 (with 24 teams qualified for the next round).
With two bronze medals and five silver medals, the French women’s basketball team has still not won a major title since their last championship in 2009. Valériane Ayayi’s teammates have systematically fallen just short, but 2025 could be the year that changes.
Finalists at the Paris Olympic Games, they were only a hair’s breadth away from stopping the American domination, which remains undefeated since 1992. Under the direction of Jean-Aimé Toupane, they have found a solid defensive identity in 2024, positioning themselves as serious contenders for the European title. The competition begins on June 19 against Belgium, Italy, Germany and the Czech Republic.
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Whether in the Tour de France or in the classics, Tadej Pogacar dominated 2024, delivering one of the greatest seasons in cycling history. At only 26 years old, the Slovenian reigns supreme. Who can stop him from repeating the feat in 2025? Remco Evenepoel and Primoz Roglic remain outsiders but seem too far away to reach Pogacar’s level for various reasons.
The only one who could stand up to him is Jonas Vingegaard, who won two Tour titles in 2022 and 2023. Fully recovered from his injuries, the Dane will start 2025 in great shape, ready to clash with the Slovenian in July. Can he prevent Pogacar from winning a fourth Tour title that would bring him closer to cycling greatness?
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The announcement of his return to road racing raised high hopes. Recently crowned Olympic mountain bike champion, Pauline Ferrand-Prévôt revealed she was returning to the professional peloton after a five-year break. In 2025, the Frenchwoman will race for three years with Visma-Lease a bike, aiming for nothing less than victory in the Tour de France this summer.
After finishing second in the Giro in 2014, she faces tough competition, notably against a French team, GDF-Suez, which signed Juliette Labous and especially Demi Vollering, the winner of the 2023 Tour de France.
The French team continues to chase its first major title. Fourth at the 2011 World Cup and semi-finalist at Euro 2022, they fell just short this year, finishing second in the Nations League against Spain.
During Euro 2025, which begins on July 2, Wendie Renard’s teammates will have the opportunity to overcome the final stage. However, obstacles arose from the group stage, as they faced the ‘group of death’ alongside England and the Netherlands, the last two winners, and Wales.
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1990 marks the last year where two clubs from the Paris region coexisted in the elite, with PSG and Racing. It has been 35 years since this happened, which is rare for a European capital. Will Paris FC, recently acquired by the Arnault family, manage to come back to face PSG again?
Long leaders of Ligue 2, Maxime Lopez’s club lost first place to Lorient to end the year but remains well positioned after 16 days of the championship to climb towards the elite. Will we see a Paris derby in Ligue 1 next season?
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Léon Marchand is the French star of 2024. With four Olympic titles, an unprecedented achievement for a French athlete in a single edition, he has entered a new dimension. After skipping the short course World Championships, he will participate from July 11 to August 3, 2025, in the long course events, where he already holds five titles.
In Singapore, the Frenchman will try to equal Michael Phelps’ record (established in Melbourne in 2007) of five individual titles in a single edition. Marchand will likely swim in four 200-meter events (freestyle, breaststroke, butterfly, and medley) as well as the 400-meter medley, a record he has held since the 2023 Worlds in Fukuoka. With the addition of one or more relays, the haul of medals could be immense for the Toulouse native, who will celebrate his 23rd birthday next May.
Eunice Barber remains the last French woman to become world champion in athletics, achieving it in Paris in 2003. It has been 22 years since a French female athlete succeeded in replacing her in the long jump. Can Cyréna Samba-Mayela put an end to this famine?
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As European champion and Olympic vice-champion in the 100 meter hurdles at the Paris 2024 Olympics, the athlete from the Île-de-France region will likely be the closest French representative to gold from September 13 in Tokyo.
In one of the biggest transfers in Formula 1 history, Lewis Hamilton, with 18 seasons and a record seven world titles under his belt with Mercedes, has opted to move to the rival team in 2025. He will now race for Ferrari, in a partnership few could have envisaged.
However, at 39, the Briton finished the previous season in seventh place in the drivers’ championship (with two Grand Prix victories), which raises questions. Alongside Charles Leclerc, will he be the key to helping the Scuderia regain a world champion since Kimi Räikkönen in 2007, or a constructor’s title that has eluded them since 2008, narrowly missing this year by only 14 points?
