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This is confirmed by the football association in a press release on Sunday night.
The team will be led by the U21 coach, Leif Gunnar Smerud, as the national coach, Lars Lagerbäck, is in quarantine. The team will consist exclusively of players who play for foreign clubs, plus one player from the elite series who has recovered from the coronavirus infection.
– Despite a special entry, I hope to meet the players who in a chaotic situation have responded with great good will to help the national team in a demanding situation. Now it’s about preparing to put in a good showing against Austria, says acting director of the national team, Leif Gunnar Smerud.
It is not clear who is on the team
The NFF really wanted the players to travel directly to Vienna and meet there, but due to strict entry rules in Austria this was not possible. Instead, players travel to Norway and check into a hotel in Gardermoen.
The team will continue to Austria on Tuesday. The plan must be approved by both the Norwegian Health Directorate and the Ministry of Health, NFF writes in the press release.
The template has not yet been submitted. It will arrive on Monday morning at 11 a.m., the NFF writes in the press release.
– These have been demanding evaluations, but now we are happy that the match can be played, both sportingly and out of consideration of our obligations to UEFA and the tournament in which we participate. The boys themselves and their clubs have been very positive by showing up on short notice. to complete this match, says Secretary General Pål Bjerketvedt.
The game can be decisive in the national league. If Norway wins the match, their group will also win. They then have an additional chance to qualify for the World Cup in 2022, and to be promoted to A level in the national league.
Players from eleven countries
Throughout Sunday, the NFF has worked to contact a large number of foreign club players to see if they may be relevant to play the important national league game. Several media outlets have identified who has been requested. You can see the overview here:
The players hail from clubs in eleven different countries, so they arrive in Norway before leaving for Austria on Tuesday.
Why players from the Norwegian elite league are not included in the squad is currently uncertain. Regulations in Norway still state that players who play international matches are exempt from inbound quarantine when they return to Norway. The squad that was originally going to travel to Romania and Austria could not leave because they are deployed quarantine, something that the players of the national team are not exempt from. When NRK asked NFF about this previous Sunday, we received the following response:
– We still need Sunday to work on a solution. We do not go into details about this today, wrote NFF director of communications and public relations Gro Tvedt Anderssen in an email to NRK.
