Team From Arctic Circle on a Fairytale Champions League Run

Bodo/Glimt are on the march in the UEFA Champions League after dumping out European giants Inter Milan – the latest chapter in a remarkable rise for the tiny club from north of the Arctic Circle.

Kjetil Knutsen’s team reached the last 16 of the biggest club competition on the planet on Tuesday, thanks to their two wins over last year’s runners-up – a 5-2 aggregate victory giving them the greatest result in their history.

The team from the Arctic Circle have been the fairytale story of this season’s competition.

“It has been a journey. There is a large group of us who have been part of it. There are unbelievably many people behind this ‌who have such strong belief in the project,” Knutsen said to TV2.

“I think it’s an amazing evening for the club, for the players, for the town and also for Norwegian football,” added Knutsen, who has been in charge of Bodo/Glimt since 2018.

“We are not talking about goals, we are talking about how to perform and how we can take steps and develop the players and the team. Now I think that’s extremely important.

“We have our way to do it, and that’s really important.”

The latest triumph was their fourth straight win in the Champions League, with Manchester City and Atletico Madrid also falling in the final two league phase matches, which allowed Bodo/Glimt to snatch a spot in the knockout playoffs.

Bodo/Glimt were only promoted to Norway’s top tier, a competition which had been dominated for three decades by Rosenborg of Trondheim, in 2017, but have since been crowned national champions in four of the last six seasons.

And since then, they have slowly risen up the domestic and European ranks, last season becoming the first Norwegian team to play in the semifinals of a major European competition with their run to the last four of the Europa League.

- AFP and Reuters