For the attention of Niels-Iceland 0 Great Britain 3 - help?

[auldreekie]

Hi Niels,

I wonder if you might know where I can get some help?

I have been helping compile a book of amateur internationalists who played for the four Home Nations and Great Britain from 1901 to 1974. That gave us 475 matches and an amazingly round number of 8,000 caps. We published the results last year but had some gaps that we are now trying to fill.

We are missing 43 caps and all in the Great Britain side. That includes 5 players from the team that played Iceland – don’t get too excited you lost this one 3:0! – in 1967. We have searched UK newspaper archives and asked around but with no luck.

If you have any ideas of where we might get some help it would be very much appreciated. This is what we have:

14 Aug 1967, Laugardalsvöllur, Reykjavik, att 3,476
Friendly
Iceland (0) 0
Great Britain (1) 3 Jonsson (og 38 mins), Haider (73), Stefnasson (og 82)
Iceland:
S Dagsson (Valur Reykjavik)
JS Atlasson (Fram Reykjavik)
A Bjarnasson (Fram Reykjavik)
T Jonsson (KR Reykjavik)
J Stefansson (IBA Akureyri)
G Jonsson (IBA Akureyri)
G Kjartansson (IBK Keflavik)
E Hafsteinsson (KR Reykjavik, capt)
B Larusson (IA Akranes)
H Gunnarsson (Valur Reykjavik)
K Arnasson (IBA Akureyri)
Substitute
H Numason (Fram Reykjavik) for Larsson after 80 mins
Great Britain:
J Swannell (Hendon)
D Gamblin (Sutton United)
I Reid (Enfield)
R Haider (Kingstonian)
G Cumming (Partick Thistle)
NCR Hopper (Queen's Park)
Referee: Lindberg (Sweden)

[niels]

Auldreekie

I have found 4 Icelandic newspaper reports of the game. Two mention some of the names you have already got, and the other two don´t mention any British players at all. All the headlines mention Iceland scoring two own goals in the 3-0 defeat. One says that the British Olympic squad will have to play a hell of a lot better in their qualifying games. KSI website has the whole Iceland team, and the Swedish ref, but no British line-up. I'll have another search when I have a moment.

Niels

PS. I can email the reports to you if you're interested.

[auldreekie]

Thanks Niels, I would be interested to get copies of the Icelandic newspaper reports of the match. I have sent you a PM with my e-mail address.

The Great Britain team heeded the advice in the newspaper report you found and improved to beat West Germany 2:1 on aggregate in November 1967 in the Olympic Games qualifying tournament. However, in the next round in April 1968 they were eliminated 0:1 by Spain.

I would very much appreciate if you had the time to take a further look for reports of the Iceland game. Here are the players we know were on the three-match tour (Iceland was the last game) but there may have been others.

Swannell J ("John") - Hendon
Gamblin D ("Derek") - Sutton United
Powell EW ("Ted") - Sutton United
Reid I ("Ian") - Enfield
Robertson JD ("John") - Tooting and Mitcham United
Cumming G ("George") - Partick Thistle
Hunter E ("Eddie") - Queen’s Park
Sleap RW ("Roy") - Hendon
Hopper NCR ("Neil") - Queen’s Park
Mackay M ("Malky") - Queen’s Park
Pritchard L ("Larry") - Sutton United
Haider R ("Rod") - Kingstonian

Thank you for your help.