Undefeated Iceland basking in underdog status at Euro 2016
ANNECY, France (AP) - Iceland's players will go into Sunday's quarterfinal against France with exactly the same approach they had when sensationally eliminating England from the European Championship.
They have nothing to lose.
As the smallest nation to appear at a European Championship, Iceland was not burdened by the expectations heaped on England in Monday's round of 16 match. And the result was one of the biggest upsets in the competition's history, as Iceland came through with a well-deserved 2-1 victory.
"The pressure was always so much more on England. This was a game for them to lose and I think that has a big, big effect," joint-coach Heimir Hallgrimsson said at the team's tournament base at Annecy on Wednesday. "They kinda mocked us a little bit before the game. This was a game for us, that we almost couldn't lose. We'd already won our supporters over."
And Hallgrimsson thinks the situation will be the same at the Stade de France on Sunday.
"We can go relaxed, we can show our best. We don't have the pressure of the world that we need to win the game," he said.
France has never lost to Iceland, which has a population of just 330,000, in their 11 previous meetings.
It's a statistic that will have many France fans assuming their team already has a place in the semifinals.
"No one expected this and I think maybe the most difficult (thing) to handle is the expectations," said Lars Lagerback, who shares coaching duties with Hallgrimsson. "It's always a benefit to be the underdog. France, of course, have really high expectations, like they had in England."
Both coaches know that Iceland faces a huge challenge against a team with more technical ability and the resilience to always keep going to the very end.
"That's because they have a lot of ball possession," Hallgrimsson said. "They tire the opponents, so they score vital goals at the end of games. We'll have to keep really focused and concentrated for the whole game, not only 90 minutes but 94 or 95," he said.
Hallgrimsson, who also runs a dental practice at home, compared Iceland's adventure to that of Leicester, which unexpectedly won the Premier League last season.
"They played on their strengths and we're trying to do the same. There's the same team spirit in both teams. We are willing to work for each other and that's the only way for our team," said Hallgrimsson, who pointed out that most of France's players were regularly playing Champions League football.
"There's not many in the Iceland team that has played Champions League," he said. "In individual quality you can see that they are superior. So we have to be collective and work together to make up for it."
Responding to media suggestions that England's loss was the worst in its history, Lagerback highlighted the strengths of Monday's winning team.
"We've shown in matches that we have really, really good organization, we're very difficult to break down," Lagerback said. "The players on our team deserve a lot of credit for the way they are handling the games. But I don't care. I know of our analysis from the game, we know what we did well and we know what we can improve."
One of five unbeaten teams to make it to the final eight, Iceland has already been improving as the tournament progresses. It opened with a 1-1 draw against Cristiano Ronaldo's Portugal, then matched that result against Hungary and followed up with a 2-1 win over Austria before beating England.
"We have raised the standard of Icelandic football and we will maintain that standard and keep pushing forward," Hallgrimsson said.
That standard also includes matters off the field.
Lagerback demands professionalism from the players, and even criticized some of them for being "a little sloppy" by showing up late to the team dinner on Tuesday.
Lagerback's attitude is that Iceland's players shouldn't get above themselves "just because you beat the English. We keep the standard, we're 100 percent professional. We try to build that into everything we do on the pitch, off the pitch."