A miracle called Iceland
A country of 325,000 people and a fourmonth season has reached Euro 2016. Rory Smith reports.
IN the heart of downtown Reykjavik, the final touches are being put to the fan park that will occupy Ingolfstorg Square for the next month. There will be a big screen, of course, broadcasting every single match of Euro 2016, kicking off on June 11, and the usual slew of food vans and mobile bars. In Iceland, though, they know this is more than a celebration. It is an opportunity, too.
Alongside the ordinary paraphernalia of a national party, the city council has also set up a number of games that it hopes will ‘‘introduce children to football’’. It is a measure that neatly illustrates how an island in the north Atlantic, with a population of 325,000 and a history as one of Europe’s serial whipping boys, has been able to transform itself into a standard-bearer for the underdogs.
In a little more than a week’s time, Iceland will become the smallest nation to compete in a leading finals. It is the culmination of almost two decades of work, a story that neatly maps the country’s political and economic fortunes: from boom to bust and, cautiously, back again.
‘‘In larger countries, you do not have to worry about coaching all of the kids,’’ says Siggi Eyjolfsson, the 42-year-old who could lay claim to being the most significant figure in Iceland’s journey to France. ‘‘You know there will always be some good ones coming through, just because you have so many people. We could not do that in Iceland.’’
When Eyjolfsson took up the position, Iceland’s coaching REUTERS qualifications were not recognised by Uefa; children were being taught by enthusiastic volunteers. It was his mission to change that. ‘‘At the beginning, it was just me in the department,’’ he says. ‘‘We did not have much of a budget.’’
The measures he took, though, had a dramatic impact. He employed a raft of coach educators to run courses, staging them at weekends so that coaches did not have to take time off work.
The results were spectacular. Iceland now has more than 850 coaches with their Uefa A, B or Pro Licences, or one for every 500 people in the country.
Iceland’s climate, too, presented an issue. Because of the severe winter, the football season can run only for four months of the year, and so in 2000 the first of 11 ‘‘football houses’’ – vast, indoor structures containing state-of-theart pitches and training facilities — was built. It has paid off: not just with a title but in the players they have produced: Breidablik have sold 19 players to foreign clubs.
‘‘We also had this idea that we wanted to give local players a chance in our first team, rather than searching for more expensive foreign players,’’ Sigurdardottir says.
After 2008, they were not the only ones. If much of Iceland’s planning required the sort of investment only made possible by the country’s banking boom in the early years of the century then the fruit of all that labour was only harvested with the bust of 2007.
‘‘In the years after the crash a lot of teams struggled to find sponsors,’’ Sigurdardottir says. ‘‘Those that remained could not provide quite so much money as previously. So a lot of teams had to start thinking about producing their own players.’’
The rise and the fall played their part in the little miracle. ‘‘Most of the players were born between 1989 and 1995,’’ Eyjolfsson says.
‘‘They were the first generation to benefit from the facilities.’’ In Iceland, they are determined they will not be the last. ‘‘What we have achieved is . . . sustainable.’’ This summer is the start of the party. They want everyone to be invited. TIMES