| Women's Football in Iceland | |
|---|---|
 Margrét Lára Viðarsdóttir scoring against Serbia in 2009. | |
| Country | Iceland |
| Governing body | Iceland Football Association |
| National team(s) | Women's national team |
National competitions | |
Club competitions | |
International competitions | |
Women's football in Iceland is growing in popularity. [1] [2] [3] [4]
The first women's football team in Iceland was Fótboltafélagið Hvöt that was founded in 1914 in Ísafjörður after the girls had been denied to practice with Fótboltafélag Ísafjarðar, an all-boys team. [5] [6] A year later, future actress Anna Borg founded a short lived football team in Reykjavík. [7]
It took several decades for a women's national league to form, first with an indoors league in 1971. A year later the transition to the modern day outdoor league came with 8 teams participating in the inaugural season. Few of Iceland's traditional footballing heavyweights participated at first, but came in with the main expansion in 1982.[ citation needed ]
Besta deild kvenna is the highest tier of women's football in Iceland.[ citation needed ]
Since the 21st Century Iceland has seen an upsurge of success with the national team qualifying for the UEFA Women's Championship four times and their greatest achievement was reaching the quarter finals of UEFA Women's Euro 2013. [8] [9] [10]
The Iceland women's national football team represents Iceland in international women's football. They are currently ranked as the 14th best women's national team in the world by FIFA as of August 2023. On 30 October 2008, the national team qualified to the 2009 UEFA Women's Championship, the first major football tournament Iceland ever took part in, having previously competed in the 1995 UEFA Women's Championship which was a home and away knockout competition. At the 2013 UEFA Women's Championship, they took their first point in a major championship, following a draw against Norway in the opening game.
Pétur Karl Guðmundsson is an Icelandic former professional basketball player and coach from Reykjavík. Standing 2.18 m (7'2"), weighing 118 kg (260 lb) and playing the center position, Pétur was the first Icelander and one of the first European players ever to play in National Basketball Association (NBA). He was also a member of the Icelandic national basketball team from 1978 to 1992 but missed several years due to FIBA rules banning professional players from playing for national teams. In 2001, he was named the Icelandic Basketball Player of the 20th century by the Icelandic Basketball Association. In 2015, he was inducted in to the National Olympic and Sports Association of Iceland Hall of Fame.
Football is the most popular sport in Iceland. Iceland hosted the U-18 European Championship in 1997, but an Icelandic national team has qualified for the final competition of a major tournament only five times—thrice by the women's national team at UEFA Women's Euro in 2009, 2013 and 2017, and twice by the men's team at UEFA Euro 2016 and the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The only Iceland teams to advance past the group stage at a major tournament are the women in 2013 and the men in 2016.
Sif Atladóttir is an Icelandic former footballer and a former member of the Iceland women's national team. During her career, she won the Icelandic Championship three years in a row with Valur, from 2007 to 2009.
Katrín Ómarsdóttir is an Icelandic football coach and former player who played the midfielder position. Before spending four seasons in the English FA WSL with Liverpool and Doncaster Rovers Belles from 2013, she had played professional football in Sweden and the United States. Katrín has over 60 caps for Iceland's national team and represented her country at the 2009 and 2013 editions of the UEFA Women's Championship.
Sara Björk Gunnarsdóttir is an Icelandic professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for Italian Serie A club Juventus FC.
Dóra María Lárusdóttir is an Icelandic former football player who predominantly played as a winger for Icelandic club Valur. Having played for Valur for a decade and been voted national Player of the Year in 2008 and 2010, Dóra María was for many years one of Iceland's leading female footballers. During her career, she won the Icelandic championship eight times and the Icelandic Cup five times. From 2003 to 2017, Dóra María was part of the Iceland women's national team and she participated at the 2009 and 2013 editions of the UEFA Women's Championship.
Fanndís Friðriksdóttir is an Icelandic women's footballer who plays as a left winger for Valur in the Icelandic Úrvalsdeild kvenna, and currently for Australian club Adelaide United for the 2018–19 W-League season. She spent the 2017–2018 season with Olympique de Marseille in the French Division 1 Féminine and has previously played in the Úrvalsdeild kvenna for Breiðablik and the Norwegian Toppserien for Kolbotn and Arna-Bjørnar. Fanndís has been a part of the Iceland's national team since 2009 and represented her country at the 2009, 2013 and 2017 editions of the UEFA Women's Championship.
Ólafur Þór Gunnarsson is an Icelandic former footballer. He played the majority of his career in Iceland and capped for the Icelandic national team against Brazil in 2002. He played football for Flagler College in the United States, where he was a three-time NAIA All-American, All-Region XIV and All-Florida Sun Conference selection. In 2016, he was inducted into the schools hall of fame.
Heimir Hallgrímsson is an Icelandic football manager, former player and dentist. He Is Currently The Manager of theJamaica national football team.
Birgir Örn Birgisson is an Icelandic basketball coach and a former professional player who played 26 games for the Icelandic national basketball team. He won two national championships with Keflavík in 1997 and 1999. Before turning to basketball, Birgir had a successful career in swimming and was a member of the Icelandic national swimming team.
Helena Sverrisdóttir is an Icelandic former basketball player. Generally considered the greatest Icelandic female basketball player of all time, she was named the Icelandic Women's Basketball Player of the Year 12 times. During her playing career, she won the Icelandic championship five times and the Slovak championship two times.
Ívar DeCarsta Unsont Webster is an American and Icelandic former professional basketball player and coach. Following a college career at Miami Dade and Indiana State, he went on to play for 20 seasons in Iceland where he won the national championship in 1988. In 1984, he became the first naturalized citizen to play for Iceland national basketball team.
Knattspyrnufélagið Hörður, commonly known as Hörður or Hörður Ísafjörður, is an Icelandic multi-sport club from the town of Ísafjörður. It was founded in 1919 as a football club but since 1933 it has fielded other departments, most prominently in handball, track & field, skiing and Icelandic wrestling.
Cecilía Rán Rúnarsdóttir is an Icelandic professional footballer for who plays as a goalkeeper for Bayern Munich of the German Frauen-Bundesliga and the Icelandic national football team.
Fótboltafélagið Hvöt was the first women's football club in Iceland. It was founded on 14 July 1914 in Ísafjörður and its first board was appointed by Guðrún Skúladóttir, the chairman, Bergþóra Árnadóttir and Ingibjörg Helgadóttir, and the team's first coach was Einar Oddur Kristjánsson. The club operated from 1914 to 1916 and the girls competed with each other as well as competing with boys' clubs in the town, so-called "Púka clubs". The clubs training grounds were at Hrossataðsvellir and they played their games there and at Tangstún and Riistún.
Björn Zoëga is an Icelandic orthopedic surgeon, a former director of the Landspitali National University Hospital of Iceland and current director of Karolinska University Hospital in Sweden.
Karl Eðvarð Þórðarson is an Icelandic former footballer who played as a midfielder, most notably for ÍA. Besides Iceland, he has played in Belgium and France. During his career, he won the Icelandic Championship five times and the Icelandic Cup twice with ÍA.
Eyleifur Hafsteinsson is an Icelandic former footballer who played as a forward. He won the Icelandic championship in 1968, 1970 and 1974 and the Icelandic Cup in 1966. He was part of the Iceland national team between 1964 and 1972, playing 26 matches and scoring 4 goals.
The 1967 Denmark v Iceland football match was an international friendly association football match between the senior national teams of Denmark and Iceland. The match took place on 23 August 1967 at Idrætsparken in Copenhagen, Denmark. The match finished as a 14–2 win for Denmark and has been called the worst day in the history of Icelandic football.
 | This association football article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
  | This article about sports in Iceland is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |