Football Season Guide

Bodø/Glimt were the undoubted fairy tale of last season as they defied widespread predictions for relegation and instead stayed in contention for the title all the way until the end and secured a second-place finish, wildly punching above their weight given the lack of resources and squad quality. Now comes the hard part for Kjetil Knutsen and his squad as the expectations for them are much higher and they face the prospect of opponents not underestimating like last year. They also lost their most talented player like Hakon Evjen in the close season and have a pretty sizeable hole in their squad to fill ahead of the new campaign. Some reliable players like Erlend Reitan and Ricardo Friedrich are not part of the team too. Yet Knutsen still has a pretty good squad at his disposal and some issues that hampered them at the end of last season have been addressed. The signing of Kasper Junker means that Glimt have a strong and reliable striker to bring in the goals. Ola Solbakken is someone who can raise the level of the squad too while a Swedish full-back Alfons Sampsted could become a valuable player too. Yet, there is a bit of shortage of cover in the attacking positions and the new number one keeper, Nikita Khaikin, is definitely a downgrade compared to Friedrich.