Reykjavík Grapevine - 02.02.2018, Side 10

As the old Icelandic proverbs go: “smite
waits for no man” and “the smiting
horde gathers no volcanic moss.”
With this in mind, the Icelandic men’s
national football team continued to
warm up for their inevitable World Cup
win this year by casually plundering the
nation of Indonesia, population 261m.
For more on this, and other stories
from inside the Iceland camp, here’s
our rundown of all the latest smiting
news.
Indonesia burns
On January 11th, the Icelandic men’s
national football team inflicted a
mighty thrashing on Indonesia’s select
XI recently in an “unfriendly” pre-
World Cup run out. Amidst rumours
that the selected XI in question would
be nine rhinoceroses in defence, an
elephant in goal, and a tiger up front,
in the end, the opposition turned out
to be just eleven hapless Indonesian
footballers.
Iceland ran riot on
a pitch flooded by the
tears of the Indonesian
nation, netting six times
against the home side.
Shot after flaming shot
was smashed into the
enemy goal until it was
just two smouldering,
smashed, smoking posts
with a gibbering, wild-
eyed goalkeeper rolling
around in the wreckage muttering
about the coming of a new ice age.
Albert strikes
In the second game on January 14th,
Iceland smote the actual national
football team of Indonesia 4-1, with
20-year-old stripling warlord Albert
“The Shin Splinterer” Guðmundsson
battering in a mighty hat trick. As
previously reported, Albert is the
latest product of a footballing dynasty
that reaches back to Iceland’s very
first professional footballer, Albert
Guðmundsson, who was Arsenal FC’s
second ever foreign signing way back in
1946, and went on to play for AC Milan.
Smiting, it seems, runs in the family.
Russia freezes
In the Siberian town of Oymyakon,
located 3,300km east of Moscow,
t em p er a t u r e s d r o p p e d t o - 62° C
this week—colder than the average
equatorial temperature on the surface
of the planet Mars. Staring up wild-eyed
and frozen-lash’d into the freezing,
churning maelstrom that settled over
the town, locals reported hearing giant
beating wings and a terrible screeching
ringing down through the sky, and
seeing a giant horn-helmeted head
peering down over the town. As one
local mage grimly muttered: “The ice
age cometh. We are all doomed.”
Messi trembles
After the Indonesia raid, and this
powerful new omen, Iceland are firmly
on track to humble Argentina—and
their twinkle-toed tackle-and-tax-
dodging ballerina Lionel Messi—in
the World Cup group stages. Victory
is certain, having been seen written
in the entrails of smited enemies, so
the horde are currently chilling and
downing a few meads before setting
their mind to the task ahead.
That said, it does sound like a
strategy might be in the offing. “We
haven't planned how to stop him,” said
assistant manager Helgi “The Reykjavík
Reaver” Kolviðsson. “But we've played
against a lot of other good players too,
and we work as a team—that is our
strength.” So, to read between the lines,
the Icelandic defence may crush Lionel
the same gruesomely
effective way that The
Mo u n t a i n ( l i t e r a l l y )
crushed Prince Oberyn
in Game of Thrones,
w h i l e c a p t a i n A r o n
distracts the ref with his
beard full of confusing
magic. Easy.
Italy beckoning
for Bjarki?
After replacing dishevelled hasn’t-been
Glenn Whelan at half-time against
Nottingham Forest on January 13th, the
young Icelandic buck, Birkir Bjarnason,
finally showed Aston Villa fans what
he’s all about. Many Villans took to
social media to praise Bjarki’s galloping
performance after a frustrating spell
at the Birmingham club, but it seems
they may have already seen the last of
him. With Serie A club SPAL reportedly
interested, regular minutes would
benefit Bjarki before the World Cup,
where the blonde bombshell will be
hoping to get on the scoresheet, as he
did against Portugal in Euro 2016.
Words:
John Rogers &
Greig Robertson
Illustration:
Lóa Hlín
Hjálmtýsdóttir
Now That’s What
I Call Smiting
Iceland conquer Indonesia, plan to
master Messi at the World Cup

SPORT
10 The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 02 — 2018
Hannes Þór
Halldórsson
Age: 33 Hometown: Reykjavík
Club: Randers FC Position: Goalie
Special Skills: Blinding war cries,
death-defying leaps, shield wall or-
ganisation, psychological warfare
Nicknames: Wild Claws, The Invader
of Dreams, The Shield of Iceland, The
Tear Taxman, The Auteur of Pain
Hannes Þór Halldórsson is more than
just Iceland’s goalkeeper; he is the
nation’s last line of defence and last
bastion of national pride. When the
enemy bears down upon his goal, he
can be heard screaming “death or
glory!”—a phrase that so terrified
Croatia striker Mario Mandžukić,
he renounced his faith after a 1-0
defeat to Iceland in 2017. It is ru-
moured that Hannes’ cries returned
to Mandžukić so often in dreams
that he became imbued with sad-
ness and nihilism, believing that his
one true God would not have allowed
such anguish to continue.
In World Cup qualification, only
five attempts found their way past
ole ‘Wild Claws’ in nine appearances.
Now approaching his 50th interna-
tional battle and his 34th birthday,
only by repelling the efforts of Mes-
si, Modrić and co. can he collect suf-
ficient tears to quench his thirst and
sustain him for another four years.
Although anything other than pull-
ing on his deathly black Iceland jersey
is of little consequence to Hannes, he
is now stretching his arms for Rand-
ers FC in Denmark, having previously
played for Fram and KR, Norwegian
clubs Sandnes Ulf, FK Bodø/Glimt, and
Dutch side N.E.C. Nijmegen.
Off pitch, Hannes is known by his
friends as ‘The Auteur of Pain,’ owing
both to his reputation as a maniac,
and his extra-curricular dalliances
as a film director. If a film of Iceland’s
exploits in the 2018 World Cup is al-
ready in the works, we can surely ex-
pect a Tarantino-esque bloodbath. GR
MEET THE SMITERS
“Iceland
ran riot on a
pitch flooded
by the
tears of the
Indonesian
nation.”
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