Stjarnan reaching for the skies in Iceland

Promoted club Stjarnan, which means 'star', are living up to their name in the Icelandic top-flight after rising to second place in the table thanks to an impressive 16 points from their seven games to date.

Providing entertainment
Based in the town of Gardabær, the team's coach Bjarni Jóhannsson is as surprised as many by his team's early results in the Úrvalsdeild. "I have to admit I was hoping we'd do well in the first three games and get six or seven points, but we won them all which was a real boost for us. I never expected to be in the position we are today. It's also great that we score so many goals and often win games with a big effort in the final minutes. A football game is entertainment and I think we have delivered that. We've doubled the number of our fans to 1,000."

Winning trophies
Jóhannsson began his career in lower division football in 1985, coaching fourth division Norwegian club Askim while he earned his Master in Sports at the University in Oslo. He continued coaching on his return to Iceland, winning the league two years in a row from 1997/98 and lifting the Icelandic Cup in 1998 with ÍBV Vestmannaeyjar from the Vestmanna Islands. After stops at Fylkir, Grindavík and Breidablik, he became assistant national coach with Eyjólfur Sverrisson until taking over at Stjarnan in 2008, winning the second-tier championship in his first season in convincing style.

Extra courage
Not surprisingly, Stjarnan's success has been achieved by a side which has little experience of top-flight domestic football. "Out of our 26-man squad, I think only four have played in the top league," Jóhannsson said. "That's not very much experience, but that sometimes helps because players get extra courage and go for it. It was clear before the season started that the club didn't have much to spend. We were deserving winners of the first division...and we did well in the pre-season Lengjan Cup. So the players began to believe in the team and that gave us a 'never-surrender' spirit."

Cup upset
However, their flying start to the new season suffered a setback last week, when Stjarnan met Fylkir in the Cup. Having accelerated into a 3-0 lead after just 15 minutes, Jóhannsson's men went on to lose 7-3. "We are ashamed by our performance as we had the game in our hands but it ended horribly," said the coach. "It just goes to show that we have got to keep things going and cannot afford to slacken off. The boys learned their lesson and if I know my boys right they will show it on the pitch in their next games. There is nothing else for it." Three of the four top-division teams Jóhannsson has coached have made it into UEFA competition and the desire to return there with Stjarnan is clearly there. "It is a great thought," Jóhannsson said. "But we must not get ahead of ourselves."