The Icelandic men’s national football team smited the bejesus out of the unfortunate wretches of Qatar yesterday in Doha. In an almost-empty stadium, the “friendly” (“fiendly,” more like) match was quite a thriller. The Qatari team was well organised and their players showed impressive individual skill and a flowing attacking style, but were ultimately thrashed 1-1 by the marauding Icelandic horde.
We, now equipped with 280 Twitter characters to smite with, live-tweeted the game. Here’s our play-by-play analysis.
#ISL's second pre-#WorldCup Unfriendly match is underway in #Qatar. Gylfi starts. Diego starts. Kristínsson is in goal and just made a stellar save from a Qatari rocket shot. About ten people in the stadium. A cold front is sweeping over the vast dunes. The gods are watching.
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
A Qatari shot hits the side netting. The #ISL defenders trickle back out into the field like rivulets streaming from a mighty glacier; seemingly innocent, but when they join together downstream, a raging torrent that can sweep away entire towns. #IcelandSmites #QATISL
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Twenty minutes in, and among the skyscrapers and sand dunes of #QAT, the mighty #ISL players lope forth like wild, ravenous polar bears climbing off an arctic iceberg in Siglufjörður, starving for the taste of… goals. #MetaphorBreakdown #IcelandSmites #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
#ISL surge forth like an oceanic Atlantic swell, casually smashing the ball into the #QAT goal with such force that the net is shredded on an atomic level, dispersing into the air in a puff of silver smoke, never to be seen again. #QAT 0-1 #ISL. #QATISL #IcelandSmites
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
The terrified Qatari players flee the #ISL horde, screaming wildly as they sprint away in panic, as if their very hair were set on fire, lit by the sparks from Þór's hammer as the horn'd god smashes his anvil in the glowering, evil sky. #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld #IcelandSmites
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Blatant penalty to #QAT just then tbqh, but the ref dares not to give it, lest he be lofted into the air on an #ISL spike and sailed back to Iceland atop the mast of the team's longship. #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld #IcelandSmites
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Through the smoke and debris of the battlefield, the #QAT captain has a vision: a mighty blue ice giant crushing his teammates with every shattering step as it charges furiously forth. A tear rolls down his cheek as he holds in a silent sob. #SmiteTheWorld #QATISL #IcelandSmites
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Night falls in Reykjavík, far from the vast, flowing, torrid sandscape of the #QAT desert. An #ISL child trudges through the snow in Vesturbær, and sees a triangle of feathers lying on the frigid ground. "Omen," she thinks. "We must be smiting, somewhere." #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
#QAT players go off, #QAT players come on. All know, however, that they are headed towards certain defeat. As they shuffle on and off the field, up and down the tunnel, they know in their hearts that all is meaningless in the face of #ISL's searing Viking fury. #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
It's the 74th minute, and the #ISL players hover like hawks in front of the #QAT defence, prepared to swoop down to the earth at any moment and whip off an unsuspecting vole into the vast, burning, portentous sunset. Also, to score goals. #MetaphorBreakdown #SmiteTheWorld #QATISL
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
A #QAT player collapses under a mild #ISL challenge as if skewered by a rain of sharp, deadly spears falling into the earth's atmosphere from the lofty, distant heights of Valhalla. #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld #IcelandSmites
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
RUMOUR: The #QAT manager is begging the fourth official for a short period of extra time, worried that Aron Gunnarsson is about to explode into a berserk rage and decimate the #QAT team, charging across the field with fire crackling from his terrible eyes. #SmiteTheWorld #QATISL
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
A #QAT free kick scorches towards the #ISL goal, but is parried easily by the indomitable reserve keeper, appearing suddenly to the meagre throng to be nothing more than a pebble bouncing into an immovable glacial boulder. #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Their minds already set on the post-match @EinstokBeer, the #ISL defenders are momentarily distracted by thoughts of roasted boar and horns of ale. A #QAT player seizes the opportunity and prods home a weak equaliser. 2 minutes of stoppage time to go. #QAT 1-1 #ISL #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
Final score: #QAT 1-1 #ISL. The mighty Íslendingar leave a pitch pocked by the battle, heads held high, striding forth from the fog of war undeterred, as #IcelandsInevitableWorldCupVictory has been seen, nay, decreed, by forces greater than good or evil. #QATISL #SmiteTheWorld
— Reykjavík Grapevine (@rvkgrapevine) November 14, 2017
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