There is only one way Frode Thomassen can describe FK Bodø/Glimt’s run to the semi-finals of this season’s Europa League.
“It would be wrong not to say it’s a fairytale, because it is,” the CEO of the club from northern Norway tells me in an interview.
On Thursday, May 1, Bodø/Glimt travels to London to play Tottenham Hotspur in a stadium that could fit the entire 55,000 population of Bodø with space for several thousand more. The return leg will take place in Bodø (Glimt means “flash”), a town 140 miles north of the Arctic Circle, on Thursday, May 8.
No Norwegian club has reached the final of a European club competition. These are not only the biggest matches in Bodø/Glimt’s 109-year history — they are arguably the biggest ever for Norwegian club soccer.
The difference in revenue between Bodø/Glimt and Spurs shows the financial chasm between the clubs. Bodø/Glimt turns over about €30 million ($34.1m) annually. Spurs’ most recent accounts showed revenue of £528 million ($707.8m) — about 20 times higher.
But Thomassen is not fazed.
“Luckily, we do not compete about how much money we have,” he says.
“We shall compete 11 against 11 on the football pitch.”
A Fairytale Eight Years in the Making
The Norwegian champions’ remarkable run to the semi-finals has included victories over FC Twente, Olympiacos and, in the quarter-finals, a dramatic penalty shootout win against Lazio.
“I think young people, when they go into a home for the elderly in 70 years, they will still remember that night,” says Thomassen, who was in Rome for the “emotional roller-coaster” match.
He sees the season not as a one-off success, but the culmination of a plan to transform the club and its culture.
In 2016, the club’s centenary year, Bodø/Glimt suffered relegation from Norway’s top flight. The following season, it was promoted and survived with an annual budget of €4.2 million ($4.78m).
After relegation, the club had hired Bjorn Mannsverk, a former fighter pilot with the Norwegian Air Force who served in Afghanistan and Libya. As the team’s mental coach, Mannsverk was tasked with helping the players recover from the “collective mental breakdown” that came during the season the club was relegated.
Mannsverk was not a soccer fan. Despite being based at the Bodø air base for 20 years, his first day working with the club was just the second time he had been to Bodø/Glimt’s Aspmyra Stadion stadium.
But using techniques he had learned with his squadron, including awareness training and meditation, Mannsverk worked with players to nurture an open, trusting culture, where “performance” is valued above results.
“We can win games and be disappointed (with our performance) and we can lose games and be not that disappointed, but more happy with what we did,” he tells me.
Players are encouraged to practice mindfulness, share feedback and challenge one another without fear.
There is a focus on continuous improvement, with a mindset that “the best performance is always ahead.”
“If it works for a fighter pilot, I believe it’s going to work for a football player,” Mannsverk says.
“You can always become a little bit better. What we did yesterday is not necessarily good enough for tomorrow.”
With a reputation for playing free-flowing, attacking soccer, the club won its first Eliteserien league title in 2020. It won again in 2021, 2023 and 2024.
Qualification for European competitions has brought memorable matches against historic giants of European soccer like AC Milan, Manchester United and Celtic. Bodø/Glimt has not been making up the numbers. As well as twice beating Celtic, it secured a 6-1 win over an AS Roma side managed by Jose Mourinho in a 2021 UEFA Conference League match.
The club is currently ranked the best men’s team in Scandinavia.
“I think mindset is the most dominant factor,” Mannsverk says.
“It shouldn’t be possible what we’re doing. But it’s not a miracle — it’s hard work and mentality.”
What Spurs Can Expect From Bodø/Glimt
When Spurs travels to Norway for the second leg, the players will find an artificial grass pitch in an 8,270-capacity stadium open to the elements and with a stand from 1966.
The stadium sits only 400 metres from Bodø Airport, surrounded by mountains. The nearest large towns are 10 hours drive to the north and south.
Before the first-leg match against Lazio, which Bodø/Glimt won 2-0, snow had to be cleared from the pitch before kick-off.
“I don’t think it will be snowing (for the match against Spurs). (But) Of course it can be snowy in the first week of May,” Thomassen says.
“When Tottenham or Lazio take a flight to Bodø and come to Aspmyra, it must be like going back in time 50 years. You meet nature and you meet football in its purest sense.”
Even if the weather is not, the welcome Spurs receive will be warm. English soccer is popular in Norway and even some members of the Bodø/Glimt staff are lifelong Spurs fans.
Thomassen could have sold out the home leg “seven times” and many more fans wanted to travel to London for the first leg than the 3,000 allocation. For the group match away against Manchester United last November, 6,714 fans filled the away end — more than 10% of the Bodø population.
‘The Pressure Is On Tottenham’
Before the biggest matches of their lives, the Bodø/Glimt players will prepare as if it were any other game.
“That's important for us. Don't do something special with special games, because that will introduce some more stress. So we would like it to be kind of business as usual,” Mannsverk says.
Awareness training has taught players it is normal to feel nerves, but they have learned how to put them as “background noise”.
“You can change your perspective and say that if I'm not a little bit nervous then I'm doing something wrong,” Mannsverk says.
“The pressure is on Tottenham. We have to be brave enough to play our game.”
As revenue has increased from additional match receipts and European prize money, Bodø/Glimt has moved away from a successful player-trading model to focus more on performance in European competitions. Yet it remains committed to financial sustainability.
Last year, soccer finance publication Off The Pitch named Bodø/Glimt the most “financially-sustainable club” in European soccer.
Some of the revenue from recent seasons will be reinvested in a new, 10,000-capacity stadium, to open in 2027.
Since re-joining the top tier of Norwegian soccer in 2017, the club has played about 80 European matches with a settled squad and backroom staff.
“It’s many people carrying the same values, the same way of thinking, the same way of playing,” Thomassen says.
“We have met teams from many countries that, in one way or another, should be better than us. When you meet teams from the five biggest leagues in Europe, of course a club like Bodø/Glimt will be the underdog.
“But we have survived and we believe in ourselves. We’re going into a semi-final against Tottenham and we really believe that we can go to the final.”