Ingi Þór Steinþórsson, hier als coach van een Nationaal Jeugd Team van IJsland(Foto: Karfan.is)
PREVIEW NEDERLAND – IJSLAND
Q&A
met de IJslandse coach Ingi Þór Steinþórsson
Vrijdag 26 november 2021 gaat voor de
Orange Lions Mannen de FIBA WBC 2023 de eerste bal omhoog in de
eerste (van mogelijk twee) Groepsfases van de Kwalificatie voor het
Wereldkampioenschap. Fiba noemt dat WBC Qualifiers 2023 Round-1.
De eerste tegenstander in het eerste
Window van drie keer twee wedstrijden, die eerste ronde is IJsland –
zo op het eerste gezicht een ideale om op gang te komen – daarna
volgen Powerhouses Italïe, in het tweede Window Rusland Uit en
Thuis, en in het laatste Window moet Nederland naar IJsland en sluit
af Thuis tegen Italië. De eerste drie worden samengevoegd met de
top-3 van de groep Spanje, Noord-Macedonië, Georgië en Oekraïne,
en nemen de onderlinge wedstrijdpunten mee in de groep die dan dus
uit zes landen bestaat. Uiteindelijk plaatsen
zich er van die zes drie voor het WK dat wordt gespeeld in Indonesië,
de Filipijnen en Japan (via deze link kan je dit proces ook in
een video(1 minuut) van FIBA bekijken.
Goed, IJsland dus als eerste horde die
Nederland moet zien te nemen. Dat is een Must-win wedstrijd willen de
Orange Lions zo lang mogelijk in de race blijven voor kwalificatie,
maar IJsland is traditioneel een zeer lastige tegenstander voor
Oranje; bloedfanatiek, ze geven nooit op, spelen vaak goed als team
en hebben doorgaans de driepunter als sterk wapen. Toch zullen weinig
mensen veel weten van het IJslandse Basketball, dat ondanks een zeer
kleine bevolking de laatste jaren ongeveer dezelfde prestaties
leverde als onze Oranje Basketballers.
Om het beeld van de Nederlandse
Basketball-liefhebbers op het IJslandse Basketball wat te verbeteren,
stelde ik een aantal vragen aan Ingi Þór Steinþórsson een coach
die ik goed ken van vele toernooien en EK's met IJslandse MU18 en
MU16-teams. Zo zag ik hem hij ooit de IJslandse MU16 in de Fiba MU-16
A-divisie coachen en nodigde hij me tijdens een MU18 B-divisie eens
uit om op een rustdag een vriendschappelijke wedstrijd tegen
Saoedi-Arabië deze naast hem op de bank te komen beleven. Een deel
van de spelers van die MU18 speelt vrijdag in de Nationale Ploeg
tegen Oranje.
Als club-coach was Ingi ooit de coach
van Jason Dourissau voordat deze in Groningen voor Donar kwam spelen.
De antwoorden hieronder zijn in zijn
eigen woorden in het Engels. Sommige cijfers zijn voor Nederlandse
begrippen verbazingwekkend; zo verwacht hij dat meer dan een kwart
van de IJslanders de Live op nationale TV uitgezonden wedstrijd
zullen bekijken – ik vermoed dat bij Ziggo en NBB de vlag uitgaat
als Nederland daar zelfs maar een beetje in de buurt komt – en
telt de IJslandse Bond op een
bevolking van iets meer dan 366.000 zielen iets meer dan 9.000
geregistreerde spelers. Zouden we deze cijfers naar rato tegen de
Nederlandse bevolking afzetten dan zouden de NBB dus 428.000 leden
moeten tellen en zouden er vrijdag zo'n 4.765.000 mensen af moeten
stemmen op de ZiggoSport uitzending.
Zijn laatste nieuws is dat een van de
beste IJslandse spelers – zo niet de beste(AD) – Haukur
Pálsson(GF) geblesseerd is en niet zal spelen, net als
Captain Hörður Axel
Vilhjálmsson(PG). Dus lees vooral het hele
interview (het is te vertalen via de translate-knop op deze Blog).
AART DEKKER
Hey Ingi,
Coming Friday both our National Men's
Team kick of the 2023 World Cup Qualifiers with a game in Almere, The
Netherlands, in what could be an exciting start of a potentially
great 'Road to'. A nice reason to put up some questions about our
National Basketball Prides?
We met each other a long time ago when
I was scouting International Youth Basketball and you were coaching
Icelandic National Youth Teams in quite some European Championships
and Nordic Cup Tournaments. You know Iceland always was one of my
favourites because I love your beautiful country, and because of the
way Icelanders play, coach and live our great sport. What I like so
much of 'the Iceland way'? Because your country has such a small
population, is so far away from everything, and is often seen as an
underdog, but is always putting up a fight, plays relentless with a
'never-quit' mentality and does so in an attractive, daring and
up-tempo style. Icelandic teams are most often well coached, with
often intelligent players too, and are often topping expectations.
Never underestimate an Icelandic team!
I don't think many Dutch have seen much
of Iceland Basketball, nor do I think many people really know a lot
about it. And because a game is always more interesting when you
known more about the opponent, I 'd like to ask you about your
Basketball at Iceland, your National Team, how Dutch Basketball is
seen in your country and what the expectations are for Friday and the
Road beyond that.
Because of another bizar COVID19-peak
also this game will be played without a crowd; a disappointment for
everybody.
Question: can you sketch a short
overview of Icelandic Basketball? What's the membership of your
Federation? How many people play the game in total, and how are they
split over categories Men, Women, seniors and youth? How many people
are somehow involved somehow with Basketball? How does the sport rank
in popularity compared with other sports?
Answer: In
2020, there were a total of 9030 registered basketball players in
Iceland. Basketball has grown considerably over the last ten years,
with a rise in the number of players and attention in the media.
A breakdown of the
numbers from 2020 shows that we had just over 6100 male players and
about 2900 female players. I have broken down the difference between
genders and age in the table below.
|
Gender
|
Age
|
2020
|
|
Male
|
0-12
|
2672
|
|
Male
|
13-18
|
1730
|
|
Male
|
19+
|
1757
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Gender
|
Age
|
2020
|
|
Female
|
0-12
|
1394
|
|
Female
|
13-18
|
845
|
|
Female
|
19-25
|
632
|
In general, basketball
is probably the second biggest sport in Iceland, when we take
everything into account. In terms of registered players, we are the
fifth biggest. When we include the number of spectators, attention,
and media coverage, basketball is now the second biggest sport in
Iceland.
Question: can you also sketch the
mission of the Federation? And how it is organized? What is the
filosophy on Talent-development not only of players, but also of
coaches, refs and so on?
Answer: Our Federation has
the ambition to do the best for Icelandic basketball; we did great
playing in two Eurobasket Tournaments with the Men in recent years,
and I hope to see the team there sometime again. The Federation has
good connection to FIBA after our former President Ólafur Rafnsson
was president of FIBA Europe until he passed away way too soon. Our
President today – Hannes Jonsson – is working hard for
Icelandic Basketball, and our board is doing all they can so our
National teams can compete on as high a level as possible.
We have been working with a good
philosphy with our youth national teams and the future for Men´s
National Team is bright; we have talented players coming out of our
youth program. Coaches and Refs here in Iceland have a high ambition
to do well, and are always willing to learn and add to their game. We
have coaches who live basketball and sacrifice all
their spare time to work hard with our youth players.
And for our Youth
Program; it´s a mix of a good program with our youth national teams
and coaches that were willing to practice a lot, setting a standard
to run good program for our youth teams. We did not always partcipate
in every possible European compition, but when we did not, we still
practised a lot and used our opportunities well. Youth team clubs
here in Iceland did a good job also; they went abroad too and played
for example in the Scania Cup Tournaments with good results, and all
volunteers and parents around all of basketball here have been
amazing helping all the players to have those opportunities. We start
with our players in program when they are 11 years old and we have
solid program for them all the way to our Men´s team.
Question: how many clubs are there,
and how does the League look like? Is there anything typical for
Icelandic clubs?
Answer: We have on the men´s
site 4 leagues with around 38 teams, 12 in the Top Leagur, 10 in 2nd
divsion, 10 in 3rd division and 6 in 4th divsion. The level on our
top league is continuously getting stronger, and players that do well
here in our league are signing in the big leagues in Europe. The next
step should be that Icelandic clubs start play in the Fiba Europe Cup
again; I really hope the best teams will do that. On the Women's side
we have a Top League with 8 teams and 2nd league with 11 teams.
Question: Iceland drew a lot of
attention and respect in our country with the National Program for a
Healthy Youth to take them away from drinking alcohol and using drugs
as much as possible. Can you sketch that in brief? How did that
program influence the development of the sport of Basketball?
Answer: The Government
provided the money a little bit, but in order to have everything
running smoothly, the Federation had to invest more of it's own. Our
government understands how important it is for youth to stay in sport
and are always trying to do better on supporting for them.
Question: How is Dutch Basketball –
and more specifically our National Men's Team – seen in your
country and your Basketball Community?
Answer: We have good respect
for Dutch Basketball we have had some few Icelandic Players over
there but that´s some years ago. Your National Youth Teams are
strong with good height, something that we haven´t got a lot of.
Icelandic people don´t know too much of Dutch Basketball because we
don´t see it in TV. It´s more the coaches that are around our
National Youth Teams and the Men that know all about it.
Question: What a lot of
people here won't know is that your
Men have played at EuroBasket more often in recent times than
ours. I expect every Icelandic fan and insider to know that. How is
this match-up seen; what are the expectations for this crucial game
for both of us?
Answer: I think almost every
Icelandic Basketball Fan was supporting our National team at
Eurobasket, first in Berlin and then later in Helsinki. The team did
good and there where a lot of other strong Basketball Nations that
“should” have participated but weren´t. Our team has a great
coach and the level of our players is good. We have finally have
height on our team in Tryggvi Hlinason that we didn´t have when we
participated on EuroBasket tournaments, but like I said earlier the
future of our National team is good and we have players with big
hearts for their National Team. I believe that the expectations for
both teams are to leave each other behind in this group to qualify
for next round.
Question: Are there things people
here should know? Things like how many players on the Roster are
playing abroad (or did earlier) and for what kind of clubs they play?
How many went to College in the USA, and how many played in Europe as
youngsters? What can we Dutch expect to see Friday? How about the
coaching staff?
Answer: On our National Team
today we have only five of our
12 men roaster playing abroad, but two of them – Martin
Hermansson and Tryggvi
Hlynason – play in the ACB in Spain. Six players of
the team played in college in the US, of whom Jon
Axel Gudmundsson played very well with Davidson. The
rest of the players play here in the Top League which – like I
mentioned before – is more competive than ever before. We are
missing Haukur
Pálsson – who played in the ACB last season –
he´s injured, and so is our captain for last games Hörður
Axel Vilhjálmsson. Still we show up with good and
exciting team and we look forward to watching them play against you
guys. We have three players on the roaster that have been with youth
programs in Spain and Italy. Our coaching staff is good and our head
coach Craig
Pedersen has been with the team for more than 10 years
now and he has done a very good job with his staff.
Iceland coach Craig Pedersen beams with pride(Foto: FIBA.basketball)
Question: How many people are
expected to follow the game, live or postponed?
Answer: All basketball fans
in Iceland will be able to watch the game on our national TV so they
don´t have any excuse to skip the game. I would say 100.000 people
will watch the game, but remember that we are 350.000 here in Iceland
Question: After the game Friday,
your men travel on to Russia. How about that game?
Answer: Our team goes into
all games to win, but Russia is very strong team and we are realistic
about our chance against them. We might see players that played less
minutes on Friday play more in that game.
Ingi Þór Steinþórsson hier met gust-Sigurdur-Bjorgvinsson, FIBA certifiede coaches (Foto: kki.is)
Bonus Question: I also always
enjoyed watching Icelandic teams, and meeting with all of you guys,
because it felt like you were a strong community, with a shared sense
of purpose, and a lot of will to work all together. Was my feeling
correct? And could you describe how it is to work in such a
community? I think we here could use more of that..!
Answer: For a long time we
had few coaches working together with the youth national teams and we
made a very strong force. We achieved amazing results of having our
MU16 and MU18 in the A-divisions, and later our MU20 also in the
A-division. It's different now; we see more changes on coaches now
from year to year.
Thanks Ingi!
I hope we get a enjoyable game on
Friday!
Greetings,
AART DEKKER
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Eric Boorsma 
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