“I think the league structure is pretty good that way it is. The leagues are semi-professional. The players get paid, but they all do some job on the side and some do university. Many clubs are gambling too much with the money. They are paying too much with the salaries, so I don’t think there is room for making it fully professional. The best teams that always qualify for Europe and receive money from that can maybe afford to pay more with the salaries and bring in more foreign players, but there is no way a club can bring a full team of players making $100,000. I don’t think anyone is interested in it, really. Unless there is a team that qualifies for the UEFA Champions League, they would have the money to do it, but other than that, who knows?”
Arnar Bill exudes an academic pragmatism. “I would say that Icelandic football has its own individual and national identity. We can’t copy what everyone else is doing. We are so few. If you spare me, I will tell you a story about why we are so successful. The main reason is the club culture, which I will explain. In Iceland there are no professional clubs. Every club is amateur. And when you are born into a neighborhood you go and play with your local team and that’s just how it is. And if your parents stay in that local neighborhood, you continue to play in that local neighborhood. You don’t change teams. Very few do. Everyone gets the same coach, everyone gets the same opportunity, and everyone gets the same amount of training sessions. The very best players might get to play with age group above to get better training opportunities. The girls are allowed to play with the boys to get more speed within a training session.”
The boldness of the Icelandic approach is the player-first philosophy and where football is not used as a way to eek money from parents and players. Rather, it is viewed a sporting pursuit that harnesses the strengths of a proud footballing nation. Arnar Bill is quick to point out that Icelandic football aims to avoid falling victim to a culture comfortable with using misleading buzzwords and catchphrases.
“Each team has its own way of producing talent. The word ‘academy’ is getting overused. Everything is called ‘academy’. We do not do this. Each club tries to do its best for the best players, of course. But, everyone has the same service and the same amount of training sessions. As they get older, we try to do a little bit more for the absolute best players. Maybe they get an extra training session or they are allowed to train up an age group. But there are no formal academies.
“During the winter, we have a lot of training sessions. Every other weekend we have a training session for the boys and the other weekends we have a training session for the girls who play on the national teams. So we train the top kids are getting additional training sessions throughout the winter. The other countries get more games, but we get more training sessions because of where we are situated. It’s very expensive for us to go and play a game with the national team. So, 95 percent of the development is done with the clubs, and about 5 percent is done with the national teams, which is about 10 weekends [comprised of two training sessions per weekend] a year for the youth national teams.”
The current Icelandic national side boasts a golden generation of talent and Arnar Bill describes the present, realistic expectations for the individual players and the national program beyond qualifying for a major international tournament for the first time in its footballing history.
“Definitely qualifying for the Euros in 2016, we were so close to qualifying for the World Cup, but we lost in the playoffs against Croatia. But, that was the first time we’ve reached the playoffs. We started the group play very well. Even though there are only four games down and six to play, we have started well and there is a realistic chance to qualify. That is definitely the goal. Every year about 5-10 Icelandic players leave to go abroad to become professional players… so that [export of Icelandic talent] won’t stop. It will only increase, in my opinion. We will have more and more professional players.
“But you spoke about the Golden Generation, that’s a good expression because those same guys qualified for the finals of the under-21, and now they are playing together on the senior national team. So I think the mentality in the group is very good. For example, when we beat Holland, the mentality of the group was so strong. After we won there was no celebrating on the pitch. It was ‘Well done. Next game. Come on, guys’. They were not huddling in the middle, screaming and celebrating. It was just, ‘Now we beat Holland, next game, come on!’ It’s pure focus.”
Success in international football has seen the country’s FIFA rankings, which Arnar Bill admits is “a strange list”, rise 100 places in the past year, from 135 to 35. Many of the top players take a gradual approach to establishing themselves abroad.
“I think the decision about what league to go to is up to each player and the kind of player he really is. Some are brilliant in the Dutch league and others do well in Scandinavia. But the mentality is most of the players start by going to Scandinavia. And they are not going to Scandinavia to become a legend in Scandinavia. They are going to Scandinavia to use it as a springboard to go to England, Italy or Spain. That’s the mentality. There are only a few players going straight to England or the Netherlands and right away succeed at the first attempt. Most of our players who go abroad young, they go to a big club, which is maybe too big, and they have to take two steps back before they go up again.
The exceptions are maybe Gylfi Sigurdsson who went to England, and he started with Reading and played a few games for their senior team. And Jóhann Berg Guðmundsson who went to AZ Alkmaar. So players have to think about their football and maybe get a good education before going to Scandinavia to make the step up again if football doesn’t work out. That’s the trend really. Many go to Norway, and succeed there, then transfer to bigger leagues.”
The senior national side under the tutelage of Swedish coach Lars Lagerbäck relies on the same principles that players are brought up playing. The players representing Iceland are technical and intelligent. The years of guidance from high-level coaching from their earliest introduction to the game to the professional level is evident according to Arnar Bill.
”We always play 4-4-2. We always play fast. We always play with two strikers. The style of play is number one. The work rate has to be high the entire time. If a player cannot work for us, they do not play. Some players can be the top scorers in Holland or Norway but can’t make the starting XI for Iceland. It’s about having a fantastic work rate. We can’t have any relaxed players on the team that don’t want to run. When we win, we don’t change the winning teams.”
So what does long term success for Iceland really look like? Arnar Bill conveys a great deal of modesty and humility, traits that serve the Icelandic people well.
“I don’t think anyone has thought that far to be honest. I think, if we were to qualify [for Euro 2016], the FA will get much more money to spend. That will help our youth national teams to develop. Like I said before, we don’t play as many games as the others do. We just can’t afford it. So, this will help the youth national teams and the women’s national teams if the men succeed. Improved financial status will help us. The next goal will be qualify again. We can’t take it for granted to qualify again. It will always be about the next tournament in 10 or 15 years. ‘Let’s do it again and again’. I don’t think we can say ‘Okay, let’s reach the semi-finals or finals’. For us, we’ve never qualified, so let’s start with that.”
Iceland’s ability to set a standard for its coaches that is just as high as that of its players is evident. Players who learn the game the right way from well-qualified coaches has fostered a generation of Icelandic players vying to establish themselves in European and international football. There are lessons to be gained and plaudits to recognize for this proud nation.
Some 3,500 miles to the west is the United States and 1,000 miles to the east is Great Britain.
Both boast better infrastructure, more robust economies, and deeper sporting landscapes and both could learn a great deal in the realm of player development and coaching education from an island nation that has never qualified for a major football tournament at the senior level.