Iceland warm to big occasion

The list of qualifiers for the UEFA European Under-17 Championship in Belgium is generally a pretty standard one: England, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Ukraine are all present and correct, but the eighth contenders are more of a surprise: Iceland

Achievement
The country with the fifth smallest population of UEFA's 53 member nations reached an eight-team European finals for which they have had to qualify for the first time the hard way - drawing with Northern Ireland and home side Portugal before an extraordinary 6-5 defeat of holders Russia, a game Iceland led 6-0 at one stage. Coach Lúkas Kostic told uefa.com: "It took a lot of work for them to get the winning spirit and on many occasions I have had to stuff courage into them."

On the attack
Kostic explained: "Iceland are not very highly-ranked and when we play abroad we show other teams too much respect. That is OK but when we are playing we have to fight and show less respect. It takes time to get to that point but my assistant coach Freyr Sverrisson has worked hard on these things. To begin with we were not very keen to attack in the big tournaments but as we played more games we saw that we can compete with those teams. It meant a little bit more work for us but we got there."

Arriving in Iceland
Born in what is now Croatia in 1958, Kostic played alongside Davor Šuker at NK Osijek before moving to Iceland in 1989 after a successful club career. In 2003 Kostic was appointed Iceland's U17 coach, and a year later came within a 1-0 defeat by England of qualifying for the European finals before going one better this year.

Investment
Such results do not come out of the blue, and Kostic, also the U21 coach, puts it down to the overall footballing culture encouraged by the Icelandic Football Association (KSÍ). He said: "The status of Icelandic coaches is good, all teams have educated coaches and are not just parents. Facilities are also good, so far there are 111 small artificial turf pitches and six indoor full-size football pitches all over Iceland and still increasing."

Talent spotted
That can be seen with the increasing number of Icelandic players being spotted with the national youth teams being signed by leading foreign clubs. Last season Kostic's charges ended up with Celtic FC, Charlton Athletic FC and Everton FC while his current squad has Viktor Illugason at Reading FC and SC Heerenveen's Björn Jónsson, not to mention striker Kolbeinn Sigthorsson, who scored four goals against Russia and has been linked with as many as 20 clubs, not least Arsenal FC. "There has been a revolution in recent years," Kostic said. "And the fact is Icelanders love football and the boys are ready and willing to play for their nation. The level of the Icelandic U17 team is up to European standards."

'New chapter'
Kostic's squad has the chance to prove themselves next week when they face England, hosts Belgium and the Netherlands in U17 Group B. The coach said: "This tournament will be quite an experience, a great moment for Icelandic football. Every successful kick with be good for the spirit. We have already written a new chapter in Icelandic football and the boys can walk tall."