Norway have emerged as one of the most compelling stories of the 2026 World Cup, reaching the quarter-finals despite having a population barely larger than Scotland’s.
Erling Haaland has been their standout performer, scoring seven goals at the tournament, establishing himself as the poster boy of this exceptional Norwegian side.
Martin Odegaard, who captains both Arsenal and the national team, has been equally influential in shaping Norway’s impressive run through the competition.
Remarkably, 17 of Norway’s 26-man World Cup squad play in Europe’s top four leagues, spanning the Premier League, Bundesliga, La Liga, and Serie A.
While Scotland and Norway share a similar population size, the footballing gap between the two nations has grown significantly in recent years.
Both countries spent 28 years away from the World Cup after the 1998 finals in France, but their paths in 2026 have diverged dramatically, with Norway facing England in a quarter-final on Saturday.
Norway beat both the Ivory Coast and Brazil in the knockout phase, while Scotland failed to progress beyond the group stage under Steve Clarke.
Hakon Grottland, head of player development at the Norwegian Football Federation, says this success is the result of more than two decades of deliberate planning and investment.
“When I started with the football federation in 2010, it was my dream that Norway could compete at the World Cup because we had too many years of talking about 1998,” Grottland told BBC Sport.
He attributed Norway’s transformation to two key pillars: a major investment in artificial pitches between 2000 and 2010, and a coaching revolution sparked by the establishment of the National Team School in 2013.
Between 2016 and 2025, Norway built 539 new artificial pitches while renovating a further 586, fundamentally changing how and when the game could be played across the country.
“Football in Norway went from a summer sport to a whole year-round sport,” Grottland explained, adding that players of his generation “had to play on horrible pitches in the winter, on ice and things like that.”
Playing on consistent, reliable surfaces has gradually shifted Norwegian football away from the workmanlike defensive style associated with the 1990s toward a more technical approach.
Norway’s gambling regulations have also played a crucial role in funding this transformation, with state-owned operator Norsk Tipping donating 64% of its proceeds to sporting purposes.
In 2026, Norsk Tipping generated more than 2bn Norwegian kroner, equivalent to £152.7m, specifically directed toward sports facilities across the country.
The National Team School, known as the NTS, was established in 2013 following Norway’s failure to qualify for Euro 2012, and has since become a cornerstone of player development.
Of the 15 players who featured in Norway’s 2-1 victory over Brazil, 14 had represented the national team at youth level and 11 were part of the NTS pathway from under-15 or under-16 level.
Grottland described the NTS not as a centralised academy like France’s Clairefontaine, but as “a national development structure connecting grassroots clubs, districts, top clubs and the federation.”
“It’s not like in other countries where the top clubs are working on talent development and the grassroots clubs are just having fun,” he said, adding plainly: “In Norway, everyone’s in it together.”
Children in Norway stay with their grassroots clubs until the age of 12, compared to England where Premier League academies often select promising players as young as eight.
Grottland cited Haaland as proof of this philosophy working, noting that at 14 “nobody thought he would become the best player in that age group” when he first entered the NTS structure.
The player who most inspired the NTS philosophy, however, was Odegaard, who Grottland first encountered at the age of 11 and described by saying “I’ve never seen anyone like him as a child.”
“In Norway, a talented player is a player who loves the game the most,” said Grottland, emphasising that the federation does not measure physical attributes but instead asks: “does the player love this game?”
Norway manager Stale Solbakken acknowledged the collective effort behind his squad’s success, telling BBC Sport: “It’s hard work from the clubs, hard work from the federation.”
Grottland believes the togetherness seen through the Viking row celebration, which has taken over stadiums and Times Square this summer, perfectly captures the spirit the NTS has spent years building.
