From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match24 Dec 2029
Nobody above Valur
First, on 50 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
The dugout24 Dec 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad24 Dec 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad24 Dec 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout24 Dec 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Frederik Schram is on it.
The dugout24 Dec 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market17 Dec 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mouhamadou Fall will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market17 Dec 2029
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad17 Dec 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakob Franz Pálsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Boardroom17 Dec 2029
Wages eat 115% of everything Valur earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
The dugout17 Dec 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad17 Dec 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Stefan Hermannsson and Valur agree another 3 years.
The dugout17 Dec 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market17 Dec 2029
The name of Albin Skoglund keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Valur say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market10 Dec 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad10 Dec 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad10 Dec 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout10 Dec 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout10 Dec 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market10 Dec 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Market10 Dec 2029
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout10 Dec 2029
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Market10 Dec 2029
3 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Valur could get for him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market3 Dec 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Orri Sigurður Ómarsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad3 Dec 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Samúel Kári Friðjónsson commits to Valur for another 2 years.
Squad3 Dec 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Dec 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout3 Dec 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market3 Dec 2029
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout3 Dec 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Boardroom3 Dec 2029
The numbers do not look good at Valur
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Market3 Dec 2029
1 months remain and no agreement is close. Every week without a signature costs Valur money.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match26 Nov 2029
Nobody above Valur
First, on 50 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
The dugout26 Nov 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad26 Nov 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad26 Nov 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad26 Nov 2029
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Valur know it.
The dugout26 Nov 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market19 Nov 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad19 Nov 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad19 Nov 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad19 Nov 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” William Feola commits to Valur for another 4 years.
Boardroom19 Nov 2029
108% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
The dugout19 Nov 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Gamid Agalarov is on it.
The dugout19 Nov 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Birkir Heimisson, and the manager let it.
The dugout19 Nov 2029
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Valur, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad19 Nov 2029
A window away with the national side, and a shirt at Valur that briefly doubles as an advertisement. A call-up flatters the player and the club that built him in the same breath.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market12 Nov 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad12 Nov 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad12 Nov 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout12 Nov 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout12 Nov 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market12 Nov 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market5 Nov 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Orri Sigurður Ómarsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad5 Nov 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad5 Nov 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Market5 Nov 2029
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout5 Nov 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout5 Nov 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Squad5 Nov 2029
The captaincy has been taken off Gamid Agalarov. Valur will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
Market5 Nov 2029
The clock does Glody Likonza’s negotiating for him
2 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Valur could ask drops and the wages Glody Likonza can ask rise.
Market5 Nov 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jakob Franz Pálsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match29 Oct 2029
The view from the top for Valur
50 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Market29 Oct 2029
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Valur heard it as anything else.
The dugout29 Oct 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad29 Oct 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad29 Oct 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Valgeir Valgeirsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout29 Oct 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Frederik Schram is on it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market22 Oct 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mouhamadou Fall will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad22 Oct 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad22 Oct 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom22 Oct 2029
139% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Lúkas Logi Heimisson, and the manager let it.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout22 Oct 2029
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Valur. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Market22 Oct 2029
The name of Albin Skoglund keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Valur say nothing, which says plenty.
Squad22 Oct 2029
Two hours a week with a tutor, which is the least glamorous thing at Valur and the one that decides whether a foreign signing is still here in two years.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market15 Oct 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad15 Oct 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Oct 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad15 Oct 2029
“The easiest signature of my career.” Hordur Saevarsson and Valur agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Valur, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad15 Oct 2029
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Valur would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Market15 Oct 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market8 Oct 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Orri Sigurður Ómarsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad8 Oct 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Gamid Agalarov commits to Valur for another 4 years.
Squad8 Oct 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad8 Oct 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Snorri Þór Stefánsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout8 Oct 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Snorri Þór Stefánsson, and the manager let it.
Squad8 Oct 2029
15 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
The dugout8 Oct 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout8 Oct 2029
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Market8 Oct 2029
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Viktor Andri Hafþórsson has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Valur.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Boardroom1 Oct 2029
Valur have won it
This is the season the town will measure the next twenty against. The trophy travels home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.
Match29 Sep 2029
The run at home goes on for Valur
20 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Match29 Sep 2029
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
14 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Match1 Oct 2029
The view from the top for Valur
50 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Match1 Oct 2029
Full time on the season at Valur
Position 1 on 50 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
Squad1 Oct 2029
A season average of 7.55 with 21 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Market1 Oct 2029
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad1 Oct 2029
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Valur will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
The dugout1 Oct 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match22 Sep 2029
Nobody wins at Valur
19 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad24 Sep 2029
15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Valur lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Match22 Sep 2029
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
13 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Player ratings24 Sep 2029
Successful dribbles: 29. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Market24 Sep 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad24 Sep 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad24 Sep 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Boardroom24 Sep 2029
Wages eat 150% of everything Valur earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Player ratings24 Sep 2029
Marked 8.01 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad17 Sep 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Kari Gudmundsson
22 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Valur lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match17 Sep 2029
Valur are in among the leaders
Position 2 and 46 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Match15 Sep 2029
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 12. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
20 goals and a season average of 7.57 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad17 Sep 2029
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Player ratings17 Sep 2029
Successful dribbles: 29. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market17 Sep 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings17 Sep 2029
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.90, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad10 Sep 2029
Kari Gudmundsson damages knee ligaments — 29 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 29 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Match8 Sep 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
18 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Player ratings10 Sep 2029
Successful dribbles: 30. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match8 Sep 2029
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
11 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
The dugout10 Sep 2029
Patrick Pedersen: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valur have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad10 Sep 2029
17 goals and a season average of 7.49. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Market10 Sep 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market10 Sep 2029
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Boardroom10 Sep 2029
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad3 Sep 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Kari Gudmundsson
37 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Valur lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings3 Sep 2029
Successful dribbles: 33. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match1 Sep 2029
A 2-goal lead gone for Valur
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Keflavik kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Valur will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Market3 Sep 2029
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad3 Sep 2029
340 appearances across 15 seasons in one shirt. Careers like that are not built on purpose any more, and Valur know exactly what they have.
Match1 Sep 2029
10 unbeaten for Valur
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 10 matches without defeat is a foundation Valur did not have in the autumn.
The dugout3 Sep 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad3 Sep 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad3 Sep 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match25 Aug 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
17 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
The dugout27 Aug 2029
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valur have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Match25 Aug 2029
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 9. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad27 Aug 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad27 Aug 2029
A move Kamil Fura would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Kamil Fura is living that version at Valur, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad27 Aug 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout27 Aug 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match25 Aug 2029
Valur get the job done against KR
A 1‑0 win over KR, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings27 Aug 2029
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 19 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings20 Aug 2029
Successful dribbles: 40. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match15 Aug 2029
Valur bow out of the cup
IA go through and Valur go home, 1‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Match18 Aug 2029
Nobody wins at Valur
16 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Match20 Aug 2029
Valur up to position 2
36 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Player ratings20 Aug 2029
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson provided it, and the 8.77 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad20 Aug 2029
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Snorri Þór Stefánsson: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Market20 Aug 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Lúkas Logi Heimisson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market20 Aug 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Boardroom20 Aug 2029
Valur close the window on a squad of their own making
11 in and 13 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings13 Aug 2029
A brace, and Gamid Agalarov takes the afternoon — 9.29
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gamid Agalarov provided it, and the 9.29 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market13 Aug 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
16 goals and a season average of 7.47 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Market13 Aug 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match11 Aug 2029
Valur make it 3 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Valur have 3 straight wins of it.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match11 Aug 2029
Fylkir made Valur work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Match11 Aug 2029
Valur keep winning on the road
3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market6 Aug 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Valur people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Match4 Aug 2029
5‑0, and Gamid Agalarov took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Valur tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Market6 Aug 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Squad6 Aug 2029
The match ball belongs to Gamid Agalarov, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Match4 Aug 2029
Nobody wins at Valur
14 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Squad6 Aug 2029
13 seasons and 242 appearances, all of them here. Careers like this are not designed; they happen to a certain kind of man at a certain kind of club, and this town has one.
Player ratings6 Aug 2029
Successful dribbles: 24. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Market6 Aug 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad6 Aug 2029
14 goals and a season average of 7.40. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market30 Jul 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Valur people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad30 Jul 2029
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Salvatore De Martino is living that version at Valur, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Transfer targets30 Jul 2029
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad30 Jul 2029
A season average of 7.30 with 11 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match28 Jul 2029
Three points for Valur, 2‑1 the final word against IA in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings30 Jul 2029
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings30 Jul 2029
Marked 8.62 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market23 Jul 2029
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valur have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Match23 Jul 2029
Valur refuse to drop out of the race
Position 3, 24 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The dugout23 Jul 2029
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Match21 Jul 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
13 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Market23 Jul 2029
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Market23 Jul 2029
Fjolnir are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Valur will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Squad23 Jul 2029
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match14 Jul 2029
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 5‑2 against Stjarnan, and it could have been more.
Match11 Jul 2029
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Albin Skoglund obliged against Keflavik. 1‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Valur.
Match11 Jul 2029
Valur win it in stoppage time
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 90th minute. Keflavik will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Squad16 Jul 2029
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Market16 Jul 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Match14 Jul 2029
Nobody wins at Valur
12 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Player ratings16 Jul 2029
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match14 Jul 2029
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 7 goals between Valur and Stjarnan, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Player ratings16 Jul 2029
Marked 9.89 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market9 Jul 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Player ratings9 Jul 2029
Successful dribbles: 30. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout9 Jul 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad9 Jul 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad9 Jul 2029
“The easiest signature of my career.” Patrick Pedersen and Valur agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad9 Jul 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Match7 Jul 2029
Vikingur left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout9 Jul 2029
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Market9 Jul 2029
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Sigurður Arnar Magnússon has his answer from Valur; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings2 Jul 2029
Two goals and a mark of 9.25 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match30 Jun 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
11 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Squad2 Jul 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad2 Jul 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Patrick Pedersen commits to Valur for another 2 years.
Match30 Jun 2029
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Gamid Agalarov. 3‑1 against Leiknir, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad2 Jul 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakob Franz Pálsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Looking ahead2 Jul 2029
The big one: Vikingur come into view
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Valur will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
Player ratings2 Jul 2029
A performance of 8.25 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings2 Jul 2029
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match23 Jun 2029
The run is over for Valur
19 matches without defeat, and then FH. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
Player ratings25 Jun 2029
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.07, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match25 Jun 2029
Valur up to position 3
17 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Player ratings25 Jun 2029
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match23 Jun 2029
Gamid Agalarov scored, and precious little else went right: 2‑3 to FH, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout25 Jun 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Frederik Schram, and the manager let it.
Boardroom25 Jun 2029
101% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match16 Jun 2029
19 unbeaten for Valur
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 19 matches without defeat is a foundation Valur did not have in the autumn.
Match16 Jun 2029
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson scored in the 88th minute, Keflavik had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Valur took the lot.
Squad18 Jun 2029
The match ball belongs to Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Match18 Jun 2029
Nobody above Valur
First, on 17 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
Match16 Jun 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
10 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Player ratings18 Jun 2029
Marked 9.85 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Match16 Jun 2029
Keflavik made Valur work for it, but the scoreboard read 4‑2 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad18 Jun 2029
100 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
Squad18 Jun 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Valgeir Valgeirsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match9 Jun 2029
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 18. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Market11 Jun 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Squad11 Jun 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad11 Jun 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tarik Ibrahimagic is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Match9 Jun 2029
It finished 1‑0, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
The dugout11 Jun 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Patrick Pedersen, and the manager let it.
Player ratings11 Jun 2029
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings11 Jun 2029
7.95, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Valur had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout11 Jun 2029
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Haukur Magnusson, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match2 Jun 2029
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
17 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad4 Jun 2029
There were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market4 Jun 2029
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Player ratings4 Jun 2029
Successful dribbles: 20. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout4 Jun 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Market4 Jun 2029
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Valur, another week without a signature from Glody Likonza.
The dugout4 Jun 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match26 May 2029
Valur cannot stop winning
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Squad28 May 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings28 May 2029
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Match26 May 2029
Valur make home a hard place to visit
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Squad28 May 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakob Franz Pálsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Match26 May 2029
It finished 1‑0, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Player ratings28 May 2029
Gamid Agalarov was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.30. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The dugout28 May 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Boardroom28 May 2029
94% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match19 May 2029
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
15 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad21 May 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match19 May 2029
It finished 3‑1, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Player ratings21 May 2029
A performance of 8.92 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout21 May 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Glody Likonza, and the manager let it.
Player ratings21 May 2029
Marked 8.28 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings21 May 2029
Marked 8.04. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Valur.
Squad21 May 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Ingimar Torbjörnsson Støle and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Player ratings21 May 2029
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings14 May 2029
Successful dribbles: 37. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match12 May 2029
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 14. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
The dugout14 May 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings14 May 2029
Ragnar Bodvarsson, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 8.33
A mark of 8.33 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad14 May 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad14 May 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces14 May 2029
At 18 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Match12 May 2029
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ragnar Bodvarsson. 2‑0 against IA, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Match12 May 2029
The run at home goes on for Valur
8 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match5 May 2029
13 unbeaten for Valur
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 13 matches without defeat is a foundation Valur did not have in the autumn.
Squad7 May 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Samúel Kári Friðjónsson and Valur agree another 2 years.
Squad7 May 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom7 May 2029
Graduation day at Valur
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad7 May 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Valgeir Valgeirsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings7 May 2029
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market7 May 2029
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Vidar Ingason has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market7 May 2029
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Stefan Bjarnason is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market7 May 2029
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Hordur Saevarsson has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market30 Apr 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad30 Apr 2029
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad30 Apr 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Boardroom30 Apr 2029
91% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
The dugout30 Apr 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout30 Apr 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout30 Apr 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Market30 Apr 2029
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Albin Skoglund’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Squad30 Apr 2029
Birkir Eyþórsson is not doing himself any favours
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad23 Apr 2029
15 days out for Patrick Pedersen after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Match23 Apr 2029
Nobody above Valur
First, on 55 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
Squad23 Apr 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad23 Apr 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Valgeir Valgeirsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout23 Apr 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Gamid Agalarov is on it.
Market23 Apr 2029
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Valur. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
The message was aimed at the stands as much as the dressing room: Jónatan Ingi Jónsson plays, and the argument is closed until the manager decides otherwise.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Apr 2029
22 days out for Patrick Pedersen after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market16 Apr 2029
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad16 Apr 2029
The medical room confirms 49 days on the sidelines for David Lagančić, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
The dugout16 Apr 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout16 Apr 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
The dugout16 Apr 2029
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Elías Már Ómarsson has written the date down.
Market16 Apr 2029
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Patrick Pedersen’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad9 Apr 2029
30 days out for Patrick Pedersen after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad9 Apr 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad9 Apr 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Guðmundur Andri Tryggvason and Valur agree another 4 years.
Squad9 Apr 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jakob Franz Pálsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout9 Apr 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout9 Apr 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout9 Apr 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mouhamadou Fall, and the manager let it.
Market9 Apr 2029
The name of Jakob Franz Pálsson keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Valur say nothing, which says plenty.
The dugout9 Apr 2029
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad2 Apr 2029
37 days out for Patrick Pedersen after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market2 Apr 2029
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom2 Apr 2029
Deadline passes with 3 signed and 8 gone
That is the business done at Valur until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad2 Apr 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Ingimar Torbjörnsson Støle and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout2 Apr 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Boardroom2 Apr 2029
Wages swallow 86% of the Valur income
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
The dugout2 Apr 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Birkir Heimisson, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad26 Mar 2029
A fracture rules Patrick Pedersen out for 46 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match26 Mar 2029
The view from the top for Valur
55 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Transfer targets26 Mar 2029
The offer went to Stjarnan this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Squad26 Mar 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Mar 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jakob Franz Pálsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout26 Mar 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout26 Mar 2029
Gamid Agalarov has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout26 Mar 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout26 Mar 2029
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lúkas Logi Heimisson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Mar 2029
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Transfer targets19 Mar 2029
Valur offered $450.0K; Stjarnan said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakob Franz Pálsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad19 Mar 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Valur can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout19 Mar 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Transfer targets19 Mar 2029
FC Copenhagen have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
The dugout19 Mar 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout19 Mar 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Mar 2029
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Transfer targets12 Mar 2029
The offer went to Stjarnan this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Squad12 Mar 2029
“The easiest signature of my career.” Jakob Franz Pálsson and Valur agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Transfer targets12 Mar 2029
Valur offered $190.0K; IA said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The dugout12 Mar 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout12 Mar 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout12 Mar 2029
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Mar 2029
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The dugout5 Mar 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad5 Mar 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Jónatan Ingi Jónsson commits to Valur for another 4 years.
Squad5 Mar 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets5 Mar 2029
Valur offered $430.0K; IA said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Transfer targets5 Mar 2029
Valur have gone to IA with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Transfer targets5 Mar 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Stjarnan have kept their man, and Valur go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad5 Mar 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jakob Franz Pálsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout5 Mar 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad26 Feb 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 41 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match26 Feb 2029
55 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.
Market26 Feb 2029
Markus Nakkim hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Market26 Feb 2029
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Valur heard it as anything else.
Transfer targets26 Feb 2029
Valur have gone to IA with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Transfer targets26 Feb 2029
$450.0K on the table at Stjarnan. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Squad26 Feb 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad26 Feb 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Tarik Ibrahimagic was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets26 Feb 2029
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Feb 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 48 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Transfer targets19 Feb 2029
Stjarnan wanted more than $450.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Transfer targets19 Feb 2029
Valur asked and Slavia Prague said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad19 Feb 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout19 Feb 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout19 Feb 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Markus Nakkim, and the manager let it.
Market19 Feb 2029
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout19 Feb 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Feb 2029
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market12 Feb 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Transfer targets12 Feb 2029
$450.0K on the table at Stjarnan. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Squad12 Feb 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Valgeir Valgeirsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets12 Feb 2029
Valur asked and KuPS said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad12 Feb 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout12 Feb 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout12 Feb 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Transfer targets12 Feb 2029
A loan enquiry to Slovan Bratislava: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Feb 2029
19 days out for Frederik Schram after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market5 Feb 2029
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market5 Feb 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad5 Feb 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad5 Feb 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bjarni Mark Duffield is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout5 Feb 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout5 Feb 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Transfer targets5 Feb 2029
A loan enquiry to KuPS: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Market5 Feb 2029
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Markus Nakkim has his answer from Valur; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad29 Jan 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 26 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match29 Jan 2029
55 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.
The dugout29 Jan 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The dugout29 Jan 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad29 Jan 2029
Valgeir Valgeirsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad22 Jan 2029
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 33 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market22 Jan 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad22 Jan 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad22 Jan 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout22 Jan 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout22 Jan 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sigurður Arnar Magnússon, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad15 Jan 2029
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 41 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad15 Jan 2029
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad15 Jan 2029
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bjarni Mark Duffield was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad15 Jan 2029
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Valur can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout15 Jan 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout15 Jan 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout15 Jan 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market15 Jan 2029
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Valur know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout15 Jan 2029
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Birkir Eyþórsson has written the date down.
In brief
-
Market
The clock does Markus Nakkim’s negotiating for him
-
Boardroom
Valur keep producing them
-
Boardroom
The Valur board choose calm
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad8 Jan 2029
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 48 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market8 Jan 2029
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Market8 Jan 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad8 Jan 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Valgeir Valgeirsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout8 Jan 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Elías Már Ómarsson, and the manager let it.
Squad8 Jan 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Hjalmar Fredricson commits to Valur for another 4 years.
The dugout8 Jan 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout8 Jan 2029
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad1 Jan 2029
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 56 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match1 Jan 2029
Nobody above Valur
First, on 55 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
Market1 Jan 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad1 Jan 2029
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Valur will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Squad1 Jan 2029
A move Glody Likonza would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Glody Likonza is living that version at Valur, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad1 Jan 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout1 Jan 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
The dugout1 Jan 2029
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout1 Jan 2029
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad25 Dec 2028
63 days out for Frederik Schram after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market25 Dec 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad25 Dec 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bjarni Mark Duffield was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Gísli Laxdal and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout25 Dec 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout25 Dec 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Dec 2028
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 71 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom18 Dec 2028
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad18 Dec 2028
32 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout18 Dec 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout18 Dec 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Valgeir Valgeirsson is on it.
The dugout18 Dec 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout18 Dec 2028
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Valur told Snorri Þór Stefánsson something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad11 Dec 2028
78 days out for Frederik Schram after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market11 Dec 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad11 Dec 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Dec 2028
Bjarni Mark Duffield falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout11 Dec 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout11 Dec 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout11 Dec 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is on it.
The dugout11 Dec 2028
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Valur, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market11 Dec 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad4 Dec 2028
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 85 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match4 Dec 2028
The view from the top for Valur
55 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Market4 Dec 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
The dugout4 Dec 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad4 Dec 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Patrick Pedersen and Valur agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad4 Dec 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad4 Dec 2028
Bjarni Mark Duffield falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout4 Dec 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Patrick Pedersen, and the manager let it.
The dugout4 Dec 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad27 Nov 2028
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 93 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The dugout27 Nov 2028
Patrick Pedersen: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valur have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market27 Nov 2028
Only the photograph left for Gísli Laxdal
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Gísli Laxdal will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad27 Nov 2028
The medical room confirms 16 days on the sidelines for Samúel Kári Friðjónsson, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad27 Nov 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad27 Nov 2028
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout27 Nov 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout27 Nov 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Markus Nakkim, and the manager let it.
The dugout27 Nov 2028
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad20 Nov 2028
101 days out for Frederik Schram after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Valur will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The dugout20 Nov 2028
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valur have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market20 Nov 2028
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad20 Nov 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad20 Nov 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad20 Nov 2028
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Valur can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout20 Nov 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Boardroom20 Nov 2028
89% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
The dugout20 Nov 2028
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad13 Nov 2028
A fracture rules Frederik Schram out for 109 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Valur will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad13 Nov 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad13 Nov 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout13 Nov 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
The dugout13 Nov 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Elías Már Ómarsson, and the manager let it.
Squad13 Nov 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Mouhamadou Fall and Valur agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout13 Nov 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout13 Nov 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is on it.
Market13 Nov 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
In brief
-
Boardroom
Valur keep producing them
-
Boardroom
The Valur board put their names to it
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad6 Nov 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 117 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match6 Nov 2028
55 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.
Squad6 Nov 2028
A move Albert Lodberg would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Albert Lodberg is living that version at Valur, and it tends to show in the first month.
The dugout6 Nov 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Boardroom6 Nov 2028
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Jakob Franz Pálsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Ingimar Torbjörnsson Støle and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout6 Nov 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout6 Nov 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Orri Sigurður Ómarsson, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad30 Oct 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 125 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market30 Oct 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market30 Oct 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad30 Oct 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad30 Oct 2028
The medical room confirms 19 days on the sidelines for Mikael Thorsteinsson, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
The dugout30 Oct 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout30 Oct 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market23 Oct 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Stefán Þór S. Ágústsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad23 Oct 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad23 Oct 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bjarni Mark Duffield was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout23 Oct 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Boardroom23 Oct 2028
103% of the income goes out in wages at Valur
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
The dugout23 Oct 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout23 Oct 2028
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout23 Oct 2028
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Market23 Oct 2028
The name of Jakob Franz Pálsson keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Valur say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Oct 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout16 Oct 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad16 Oct 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jakob Franz Pálsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout16 Oct 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout16 Oct 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout16 Oct 2028
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market16 Oct 2028
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Market16 Oct 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Squad16 Oct 2028
A wage question at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match9 Oct 2028
55 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.
Squad9 Oct 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Samúel Kári Friðjónsson commits to Valur for another 2 years.
Squad9 Oct 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout9 Oct 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad9 Oct 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout9 Oct 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Patrick Pedersen, and the manager let it.
The dugout9 Oct 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
Squad9 Oct 2028
4 Valur players away with their countries
The training ground goes quiet for a fortnight. 4 men have gone off to be somebody else’s players, and the manager is left with the ones nobody has called.
The dugout9 Oct 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Gamid Agalarov is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match2 Oct 2028
Valur finish in position 1
55 points, and the season has a number on it. Whatever it felt like from the inside, this is what it will look like in a book.
Match30 Sep 2028
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
12 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Market2 Oct 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market2 Oct 2028
Only the photograph left for Gísli Laxdal
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Gísli Laxdal will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Player ratings2 Oct 2028
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.87 for the rest of it.
Market2 Oct 2028
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Valur heard it as anything else.
Squad2 Oct 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Samúel Kári Friðjónsson and Valur agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad2 Oct 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Player ratings2 Oct 2028
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad25 Sep 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
30 goals and a season average of 7.98 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Match23 Sep 2028
11 unbeaten for Valur
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 11 matches without defeat is a foundation Valur did not have in the autumn.
Market25 Sep 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Market25 Sep 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match23 Sep 2028
Vikingur made Valur work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Marked 8.74 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Markus Nakkim falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Marked 8.25. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Valur.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad18 Sep 2028
29 goals and a season average of 7.95. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Match16 Sep 2028
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 10. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
The dugout18 Sep 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad18 Sep 2028
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings18 Sep 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.82, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Match16 Sep 2028
Leiknir made Valur work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
The dugout18 Sep 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Looking ahead18 Sep 2028
Top-of-the-table clash for Valur
Vikingur next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match11 Sep 2028
The view from the top for Valur
48 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Match9 Sep 2028
Still nobody has beaten Valur
The unbeaten run reaches 9. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
Successful dribbles: 25. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout11 Sep 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Player ratings11 Sep 2028
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 12 actions, 7.39, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Bjarni Mark Duffield falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad11 Sep 2028
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Valur can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout11 Sep 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad4 Sep 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
28 goals and a season average of 7.92 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Match2 Sep 2028
Gamid Agalarov had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Keflavik were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
Player ratings4 Sep 2028
A brace, and Gamid Agalarov takes the afternoon — 9.33
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gamid Agalarov provided it, and the 9.33 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market4 Sep 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match2 Sep 2028
8 unbeaten for Valur
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 8 matches without defeat is a foundation Valur did not have in the autumn.
Squad4 Sep 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Player ratings4 Sep 2028
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match2 Sep 2028
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
The dugout28 Aug 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market28 Aug 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match26 Aug 2028
Whatever happens, Valur do not lose
7 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Market28 Aug 2028
The shirt still fits. Guðmundur Andri Tryggvason is back at Valur, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Squad28 Aug 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Elías Már Ómarsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Match26 Aug 2028
The run is over for Valur
6 matches without defeat, and then KR. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
Player ratings28 Aug 2028
Marked 8.21 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
The dugout28 Aug 2028
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad21 Aug 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
26 goals and a season average of 7.90 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
The dugout21 Aug 2028
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Match19 Aug 2028
Nobody wants to play Valur right now
6 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Boardroom21 Aug 2028
Valur close the window on a squad of their own making
16 in and 3 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Transfer targets21 Aug 2028
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Zalgiris keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad21 Aug 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match19 Aug 2028
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Adam Ægir Pálsson. 2‑0 against Breidablik, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings21 Aug 2028
Gamid Agalarov was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.78. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The dugout21 Aug 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad14 Aug 2028
25 goals and a season average of 7.88. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Match14 Aug 2028
The view from the top for Valur
42 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Match12 Aug 2028
Another one collected away from home
9 on the bounce on the road for Valur. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Market14 Aug 2028
Valur say no — this time
The offer from Exeter City for Gamid Agalarov was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Match12 Aug 2028
Valur make it 5 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Valur have 5 straight wins of it.
Market14 Aug 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market14 Aug 2028
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Transfer targets14 Aug 2028
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: IBV keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad7 Aug 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
24 goals and a season average of 7.87 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad7 Aug 2028
337 appearances across 14 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Market7 Aug 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market7 Aug 2028
Only the photograph left for Gísli Laxdal
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Gísli Laxdal will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Match5 Aug 2028
Valur cannot stop winning
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Transfer targets7 Aug 2028
The deal with IBV is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings7 Aug 2028
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market7 Aug 2028
The shirt still fits. Birkir Heimisson is back at Valur, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad31 Jul 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
23 goals and a season average of 7.85 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Player ratings31 Jul 2028
Two goals and a mark of 9.36 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market31 Jul 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valur have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Match29 Jul 2028
Valur keep winning on the road
8 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Market31 Jul 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market31 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match29 Jul 2028
It finished 3‑1, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Player ratings31 Jul 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.28, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bjarni Mark Duffield is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad24 Jul 2028
A season average of 7.79 with 21 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match22 Jul 2028
Valur run riot against IBV
5‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Squad24 Jul 2028
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Market24 Jul 2028
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Valur people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market24 Jul 2028
Gísli Laxdal hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout24 Jul 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market24 Jul 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Player ratings24 Jul 2028
A performance of 10.00 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad24 Jul 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match12 Jul 2028
The small margins put Valur out
Out, 1‑3 to Fjolnir, and the long argument about which of the small moments decided it. The league is all there is now, and everybody knows it.
Player ratings17 Jul 2028
Two goals and a mark of 9.36 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad17 Jul 2028
A season average of 7.69 with 18 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match17 Jul 2028
The view from the top for Valur
30 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Match15 Jul 2028
Valur keep winning on the road
7 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Market17 Jul 2028
Edon Osmani hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
Market17 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The dugout17 Jul 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad17 Jul 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings10 Jul 2028
Two goals and a mark of 9.57 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad10 Jul 2028
7 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Squad10 Jul 2028
16 goals and a season average of 7.61. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Market10 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match8 Jul 2028
Another one collected away from home
6 on the bounce on the road for Valur. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
The dugout10 Jul 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Valur may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match8 Jul 2028
Valur cannot stop winning
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Match8 Jul 2028
It finished 4‑3, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Match8 Jul 2028
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Valur and Vikingur in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings3 Jul 2028
Successful dribbles: 32. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad3 Jul 2028
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad3 Jul 2028
A season average of 7.52 with 14 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Market3 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match1 Jul 2028
It finished 1‑0, and it was Gamid Agalarov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Looking ahead3 Jul 2028
Top-of-the-table clash for Valur
Vikingur next, and the two sides the division is watching meet each other. Whoever wins will be told nothing is decided in the same breath as being congratulated.
Player ratings3 Jul 2028
A performance of 8.27 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad3 Jul 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jakob Franz Pálsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
In brief
-
Boardroom
7 new boys at the Valur academy
-
The dugout
Markus Nakkim gets it from the manager
-
The dugout
The manager’s verdict
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Market26 Jun 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings26 Jun 2028
At 36 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.07, and nobody on the pitch better.
Squad26 Jun 2028
A season average of 7.48 with 13 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Match24 Jun 2028
Valur are at home on the road
5 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Player ratings26 Jun 2028
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Market26 Jun 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Stefan Hermannsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market26 Jun 2028
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match24 Jun 2028
Three points for Valur, 2‑0 the final word against FH in a contest settled by the finer margins.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match17 Jun 2028
Valur taken apart
2‑5 to Keflavik, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Player ratings19 Jun 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.98, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match19 Jun 2028
18 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.
Player ratings19 Jun 2028
Successful dribbles: 28. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market19 Jun 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad19 Jun 2028
12 goals and a season average of 7.44. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Match17 Jun 2028
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 7 goals between Valur and Keflavik, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
The dugout19 Jun 2028
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad19 Jun 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match10 Jun 2028
Nobody wants to play Valur right now
6 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
At 36 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.10, and nobody on the pitch better.
Market12 Jun 2028
Gísli Laxdal has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match10 Jun 2028
Valur keep winning on the road
4 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Gamid Agalarov
10 goals and a season average of 7.36 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Match10 Jun 2028
Three points for Valur, 2‑0 the final word against KR in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.78, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad12 Jun 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jakob Franz Pálsson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match3 Jun 2028
Valur win it in stoppage time
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 90th minute. Breidablik will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Player ratings5 Jun 2028
Two goals and a mark of 9.18 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match3 Jun 2028
Nobody wants to play Valur right now
5 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Market5 Jun 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Player ratings5 Jun 2028
Successful dribbles: 22. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad5 Jun 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match3 Jun 2028
Three points for Valur, 2‑1 the final word against Breidablik in a contest settled by the finer margins.
The terraces5 Jun 2028
He is 20 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Match3 Jun 2028
Valur keep winning on the road
3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings29 May 2028
Successful dribbles: 27. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match27 May 2028
Nobody wants to play Valur right now
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Squad29 May 2028
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Market29 May 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Stefan Hermannsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad29 May 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match27 May 2028
It finished 1‑0, and it was Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Valur.
Squad29 May 2028
Bjarni Mark Duffield falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Player ratings29 May 2028
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.99 on the card, and the Valur support went home talking about one name.
The dugout29 May 2028
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Haukur Magnusson on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad22 May 2028
6 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Match20 May 2028
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 6‑0 against Fjolnir, and it could have been more.
Market22 May 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market22 May 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Bjarki Arnaldarson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Match20 May 2028
Valur make it 3 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Valur have 3 straight wins of it.
Player ratings22 May 2028
A performance of 10.00 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match20 May 2028
6 goals in one match, Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Valur and Fjolnir.
Squad22 May 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Bjarni Mark Duffield was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Player ratings22 May 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.04, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match13 May 2028
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑0 against IA, and it could have been more.
Squad15 May 2028
The match ball belongs to Gamid Agalarov, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Market15 May 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market15 May 2028
Only the photograph left for Gísli Laxdal
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Gísli Laxdal will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad15 May 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings15 May 2028
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.81, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad15 May 2028
100 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
Player ratings15 May 2028
Marked 8.86 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad15 May 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Markus Nakkim was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad8 May 2028
The match ball belongs to Gamid Agalarov, whose 4 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Match6 May 2028
No mercy from Valur
IBV will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Valur were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings8 May 2028
Successful dribbles: 28. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Market8 May 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Hólmar Örn Eyjólfsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market8 May 2028
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad8 May 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings8 May 2028
Gamid Agalarov was on a different afternoon to everybody else
10.00. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Squad8 May 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Patrick Pedersen and Valur agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Boardroom8 May 2028
5 academy graduates step up at Valur
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market1 May 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad1 May 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad1 May 2028
A muscle injury sidelines Albin Skoglund for 14 days
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Valur will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Markus Nakkim is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout1 May 2028
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout1 May 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sigurður Arnar Magnússon, and the manager let it.
Squad1 May 2028
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Andri Rafn Yeoman is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Looking ahead1 May 2028
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Sigurður Arnar Magnússon’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Valur needing him to play as if none of it matters.
The dugout1 May 2028
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Apr 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Markus Nakkim is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Mouhamadou Fall was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market24 Apr 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Valur know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market17 Apr 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market17 Apr 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad17 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bjarni Mark Duffield is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Gamid Agalarov is on it.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Valur will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lúkas Logi Heimisson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market17 Apr 2028
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tryggvi Hrafn Haraldsson signs something — a contract at Valur or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Apr 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valur have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Market10 Apr 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market10 Apr 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Hólmar Örn Eyjólfsson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Valur the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad10 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Markus Nakkim is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad10 Apr 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Leonardo Perković and Valur agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Market10 Apr 2028
He is 20, and nobody at Valur signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Valur are still strangers to each other
6 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
Frederik Schram has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Valur will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match3 Apr 2028
The view from the top for Valur
51 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
Valur close the window on a squad of their own making
6 in and 0 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Squad3 Apr 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Markus Nakkim was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad3 Apr 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Gísli Laxdal and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Valgeir Valgeirsson is on it.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Valur will explain it as a decision about the team, and it may well be one. A dressing room has never once read it that way.
Market3 Apr 2028
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Valur, another week without a signature from Lúkas Logi Heimisson.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
The manager makes an example of Edon Osmani
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
Valur sign a deal worth $246.9K a year
Commercial news is the news nobody sings about and everything else is paid for with. The board will call it a partnership; the accountants will call it the difference between this squad and a smaller one.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market27 Mar 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valur have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Market27 Mar 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market27 Mar 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad27 Mar 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Valgeir Valgeirsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Orri Sigurður Ómarsson is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is on it.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
A promise honoured at Valur
Something was said to Hólmar Örn Eyjólfsson and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Market27 Mar 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Valur know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market20 Mar 2028
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Keflavik waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Valur is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market20 Mar 2028
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market20 Mar 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market20 Mar 2028
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Valur hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Markus Nakkim is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad20 Mar 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Kristófer Dagur Arnarsson and Valur agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Gamid Agalarov is on it.
Squad20 Mar 2028
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market13 Mar 2028
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Aalesund had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Market13 Mar 2028
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and KR waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Valur is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market13 Mar 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Valur is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market13 Mar 2028
The fee is $170.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Fylkir drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Squad13 Mar 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Roko Smoje gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Roko Smoje has just signed for Valur, and for once the answer mattered.
Boardroom13 Mar 2028
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Squad13 Mar 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Markus Nakkim was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Too much change too quickly at Valur
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match6 Mar 2028
The view from the top for Valur
51 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Market6 Mar 2028
Valur say no — this time
The offer from KuPS for Gamid Agalarov was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Squad6 Mar 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Samúel Kári Friðjónsson commits to Valur for another 2 years.
Transfer targets6 Mar 2028
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Bjarni Mark Duffield falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad6 Mar 2028
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Valur know it.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
David Lagančić and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market28 Feb 2028
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Fjolnir waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Valur is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market28 Feb 2028
The phone has started ringing about Gamid Agalarov again, and this time the name on the line is KuPS. Valur are listening politely and promising nothing.
Market28 Feb 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets28 Feb 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Aalesund have kept their man, and Valur go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market28 Feb 2028
Valur say no — this time
The offer from KR for Bjarki Arnaldarson was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Markus Nakkim falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Gísli Laxdal and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad28 Feb 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” David Lagančić and Valur agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout28 Feb 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market21 Feb 2028
Gísli Laxdal hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Valur can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout21 Feb 2028
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Valur have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market21 Feb 2028
Gísli Laxdal has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Valur they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Tempers go at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Transfer targets21 Feb 2028
IA wanted more than $68.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad21 Feb 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Markus Nakkim was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad21 Feb 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” David Lagančić commits to Valur for another 4 years.
Market21 Feb 2028
He is 20, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
Market21 Feb 2028
Fjolnir are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Valur will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market14 Feb 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Valur have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Transfer targets14 Feb 2028
Valur offered $660.0K; Vikingur said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad14 Feb 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Valur this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
A move Roko Landeka would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Roko Landeka is living that version at Valur, and it tends to show in the first month.
Boardroom14 Feb 2028
Vikingur will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Elías Már Ómarsson has pre-agreed a move to Valur, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Transfer targets14 Feb 2028
Valur asked and NK Celje said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Words at Valur training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bjarni Mark Duffield is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad14 Feb 2028
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Roko Landeka and Valur agree another 4 years.
Market14 Feb 2028
He is 20, and nobody at Valur signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match7 Feb 2028
Nobody above Valur
First, on 51 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.
Market7 Feb 2028
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market7 Feb 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Valur, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets7 Feb 2028
Valur have gone to Vikingur with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Squad7 Feb 2028
A falling-out at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets7 Feb 2028
The offer went to IA this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Transfer targets7 Feb 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. IA have kept their man, and Valur go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Markus Nakkim falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The dugout7 Feb 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market31 Jan 2028
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words exchanged at Valur
Jónatan Ingi Jónsson and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad31 Jan 2028
A row about effort at Valur
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Markus Nakkim was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jónatan Ingi Jónsson is on it.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Market31 Jan 2028
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Hólmar Örn Eyjólfsson has his answer from Valur; what he does with it is the next window’s story.