Football news and reviews by FourFourTwo.
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00:00Ask any child growing up where they'd like to play football one day and you'll
00:07get largely the same responses. England, Spain, Italy, all of the trendy and
00:11prestigious locations of the game's global appeal. One place they're not
00:15likely to say is the Faroe Islands. An archipelago of 18 rocky islands in the
00:20North Atlantic Ocean sees an average of 300 days of rain per year and 13 degrees
00:25Celsius is regarded as a hot summer's day. The island's 50,000 inhabitants are
00:30comfortably outnumbered by its 80,000 sheep. But none of this has stopped the
00:35Faroe's adopting football as their national obsession. Statistically one of
00:39the most football-mad populations on earth, roughly 10% of the entire country plays
00:44regularly, it's about to embark upon the next stage of what's already been an
00:48incredible, implausible, arguably impossible European journey. This is the
00:53amazing story in European football that nobody's talking about. This is Kaoi
01:00Clackstrick. Hailing from a town of just 5,000 people in a valley perched between
01:04two fjords and with a stadium that holds only 2,500, Kaoi have become the first
01:09Faroeese team ever to qualify for a European group stage, thanks to not one
01:14but two shock victories. Historically a giant of the Faroe Islands Premier League,
01:20the 20-time champions became their country's first ever invincibles last
01:24year. In 27 matches they won 25 times, drew just twice and conceded only seven goals.
01:31But with their domestic season running from March to October they had to wait
01:35fully nine months for their crack at this season's Champions League. They'd lost
01:39narrowly to Norwegian's Bodo Glimt in the first qualifying round of last year's
01:43competition and after being given a COVID-enforced first round bye against
01:47Slovy and Bratislava were dumped out by young boys of Bern the year prior. In
01:51short they'd never technically won a Champions League tie so few gave Kaoi any
01:56chance when they prepared to face Hungary's French Varos in the first
02:00qualifying round this July. Yet after a tense 0-0 home leg they stunned their more
02:06illustrious opponents on away soil running out 3-0 victors. It was a result
02:11that was met with disbelief in Hungary and the Faroe Islands alike. A day later the
02:17squad received a hero's welcome when they arrived back in Klaksvik and a
02:21significant proportion of the town lined the streets. There were flares, there were
02:26fireworks, it was a huge huge deal. In the second round Kaoi took on Swedish
02:31champions BK Haken. Again they managed a goal destroy at home prompting their
02:35opponent's official social media account to declare that they would return to
02:39Sweden to win the tie. The second leg was a classic, a topsy-turvy match that ended
02:453-3 with Kaoi winning out on penalties. The celebrations among the sizeable
02:50travelling contingent were not just for another giant killing but the fact that by
02:55winning this tie they'd made history. Not only had they become the first Faroe
02:59side ever to reach the third qualifying round of the Champions League but they
03:03were now guaranteed to become the first team from the islands to play in some sort of
03:08European group stage. This is by far the best time to be a fan of Kaoi or a
03:14Faroe's football as a whole. Tormund de Danielsson, chairman of the club's
03:18Blue Wave fan club tells 442 in this month's issue. This European run has already
03:24been incredible. Even if Kaoi lost their next qualifying round of the Champions
03:28League against Norwegian title holders Molde, they'd then drop into the final
03:32qualifying round for the Europa League. If they lost that they'd still go directly
03:37into the group stage of the Europa Conference League. Now if that feels like
03:41weak criteria for an incredible European story, keep in mind the fact that the
03:45Faroe's club's players are all semi-professionals. They all hold down
03:50proper jobs elsewhere. Striker Arnie Friedrichsberg who downed French Varos
03:55with a brilliant brace runs a food import business by day. Two other players work
04:00for the local electricity company with Kaoi's social media posting pictures of them
04:04installing power lines the day after their historical European triumph.
04:09Kaoi astoundingly defeated Molde 2-1 in the first leg of their third qualifying
04:14round tie. By that stage of the competition though, UEFA staging regulations
04:18meant they could no longer even play at their home ground in Klaksvik. Instead they
04:22hosted the Norwegians at the Faroe's cosy but smart national stadium in Torshaan.
04:27Two islands further to the west accessible via sea tunnels, one of which even
04:31contains an underwater roundabout. You've seen this staging before of course. It was
04:36the subject of Richard Key's famous daft little ground silly game f**k off
04:40comment during Sky's coverage of the Euro 2008 qualifiers. Granted it wasn't the
04:46worst off-air incident that was leaked during his time at the broadcaster but
04:49it's certainly the one that set the biggest impact in the Faroe Islands. The
04:53return leg wasn't to give them the fairy tale outcome. They lost albeit bravely in
04:57Norway. But not before taking another Champions League tie to extra time before
05:02going out to a 112th minute winner. This set up a Europa League playoff against
05:07Sheriff Tarasbol. After a 1-1 draw in the first leg in Torshaan, Kaoi fans were
05:12advised not to travel to Tarasbol, the capital of the unrecognised state of
05:16Transnistria within Moldova due to tensions that have grown since Russia's
05:20invasion of Ukraine. Instead Kaoi fans gathered together in front of a big screen
05:25to watch their side play the second leg, which Sheriff narrowly won 2-1 thanks to
05:30a 76 minute goal from Armel Zahuri. Given that the Moldovan champions stunned
05:35Real Madrid at the Bernabeu just two seasons ago, there was no shame in this
05:39defeat and Kaoi knew a place in the conference league group stage was waiting
05:43for them in any case. When the draw was made on September 1st they were placed
05:47into Group A alongside Lille, Slovan Bratislava and Olympia Ljubljana. They
05:52started the group in typical fashion, taking a shock 1-0 lead against the
05:56Slovakian champions before former Manchester City winger Vladimir Weiss
06:00broke their hearts with a late winner. Regardless though, with one of the
06:04trickier away ties now out of the way, their hopes of progression remain high.
06:08Kaoi are already set to reap the financial rewards of this season's
06:13European exploits. Their earnings for their summer's work will be vast by Faroe
06:17standards and have opened a debate in the country about how they best spend their
06:21spoils. One area that may need to be addressed is that of their home stadium
06:25to allow them to play all of their future European games in Klachvik. It's
06:29also been suggested that the club may buy some of their semi-professional players
06:32out of their day jobs. It's a move that everyone agrees would smash a ceiling
06:37preventing further progress but which could lead to further imbalances in the
06:41domestic league, where most other clubs are understandably miles away from being
06:45able to make players professional. Investing in their homegrown players and their
06:49new academy system which was set up two years ago could be a further boost to the
06:53Faroe Islands national team, who are already creating their own shock waves
06:57beating Turkey in the Nations League last year when they took an impressive eight
07:01points from six games. They'd of course previously created headlines during
07:04qualifying for Euro 2016 when they defeated 2004 champions Greece home and away.
07:10That loss to the Faroes at home saw Claudio Ranieri sacked, fatefully leaving him free to take the Leicester City job.
07:17And while Kaoi Klachvik might not be on the verge of doing a Leicester themselves,
07:21they've already been the shock story of European football this summer. It's taken a
07:26whole heap of courage and a talented squad but they've made history for Faroes football.
07:31The club are writing a story that will be told in Klachvik for generations and if they
07:37get their wish, it's a journey that won't stop here. If you'd like to read more about the
07:42incredible story of Kaoi Klachvik you'll find a full feature on them in this month's issue of 442.
07:46Written by Paul Watson and including contributions from several people
07:50connected to the club, it's available now from all good retailers.