If you’ve missed the last few chapters of “Lyn On Me”, you could be excused for feeling like Troy in that alternative timeline scene from the American comedy series “Community”. Things have been going spectacularly wrong for Lyn 1896 since they came within minutes of reaching last season’s promotion play-offs!
I’ll try not to spoil too much for those who haven’t yet read the most recent excerpt, but Lyn are at the wrong end of the 2. divisjon table, and Marit Enstad’s job is on the line. If the final five games go badly, then – to quote the British dream pop band The Sundays – here’s where the story ends.
Let’s get right to it, then. Will a difficult period for one of Norwegian football’s fallen giants end in survival or relegation?
THE RELEGATION RUN-IN
Hei, det er Marit, and this is the 2. divisjon relegation picture heading into the final month of the season. Things are so tight at the bottom that more than half of the teams in the division could mathematically still be relegated.
Ørn Horten are all but down after a miserable run of two wins in 22 games, and Nest-Sotra need a miracle to survive. That effectively leaves one relegation place left to fill, which we currently occupy.
We do still have a game in hand on the likes of Egersunds, Eidsvold Turn and Fram Larvik, from whom we are within five points. I think those teams from Odd 2 upwards in 8th won’t have to worry about the drop unless their form hits rock-bottom over the coming weeks.
Of those teams just above us, Eidsvold appear to have the toughest run-in, as all their remaining opponents are currently in the top six. We don’t exactly have it easy either, as we face massive away games against Fram and Hønefoss before hosting leaders Rosenborg 2. We then finish up with successive matches against the bottom two, whose relegations will probably be confirmed by then.
In short, it’s anybody’s guess who will join Orn and Nest-Sotra in the 3. divisjon next season. All I know is that I have five games left to keep Lyn up and secure my job as manager.
FRAM LARVIK vs LYN 1896 (2. divisjon, Avdeling 1 – Match 22)
To kick-off our run-in, we visited 9th-placed Fram Larvik looking for a rare away win. A week after we were beaten 4-3 at home by Eidsvold Turn, I was hoping for an easier afternoon… but an easy afternoon would not be coming our way.
I had gone back to basics tactically, adopting a more cautious counter-attacking system. That looked like backfiring after just three minutes, when Fram took the lead through Jamaican wing-back Trace Murray’s half-volley from Mahmoud Laham’s left-wing cross. At that point, some of our fans were probably worried we would sink without trace.
Fortunately, we turned the situation around over the next 15 minutes, with each of our centre-backs scoring from corner deliveries by Oskar Hansen. The first to take advantage was Nicolas Pignatel Jenssen, who applied the finishing touch to Marc Vales‘ flick-on to the far post. Shortly after that, Vales nodded another Hansen corner straight into the net for the Andorra international’s first Lyn goal.
We remained on course to take a 2-1 lead into the break… until our vulnerability from distance was exposed again two minutes before half-time. Vales tried to clear a deep cross from Petter Lennartsson, but he could only send it as far as Laham. The skilful playmaker had run the midfield show for Fram all half long, and a stunning strike from 20 yards out restored parity.
However, a thrilling first half still had one more twist left in it, as another Hansen set-piece restored our lead in the final minute. The home defence looked chaotic as our star forward Martin Trøen burst behind to volley in Oskar’s lofted free-kick.
Fram responded again just over 10 minutes after the interval. Jenssen blotted his copybook by shoving the hosts’ frontman Robin Hofer Dahl in our penalty area. He then watched on as Laham drilled his penalty beyond Alexander Vangen‘s reach to make it 3-3.
The match then threatened to swing either way over the next half-hour, until one of my substitutes struck a decisive blow. 19-year-old midfielder Jesper Sandberg had not made much of an impact at Lyn until four minutes before full-time. That was when Jesper got to a laboured headed clearance from Lennartsson, volleying it beautifully into the net from the penalty arc!
Then, just for good measure, Trøen secured the points with a long-ranger of his own in stoppage time. While questions still had to be asked about our defence, Fram’s own backline had fared terribly, and we just about deserved this morale-boosting 5-3 win.
What a result that was! Even more significantly, Egersunds had lost 3-2 in a hard-fought contest with Ørn Horten, which meant we climbed up to 11th and put the Tigrene in the drop zone instead. Sadly for the valiant Ørn team, our victory meant that their inevitable relegation had now been confirmed.
We began October by playing our game in hand, where a second straight victory would put us five points clear of Egersunds. Our hosts were mid-table Hønefoss, whose late surge towards promotion had recently stalled.
HØNEFOSS vs LYN 1896 (2. divisjon, Avdeling 1 – Match 23)
This match would be rather less eventful than our previous two, but things were still rather tense – particularly as far as our attackers were concerned. Trøen wasn’t in the same form that had given him a brace the previous week, while striker Marcus Mehnert struggled with an ankle injury before being subbed at the break.
We didn’t really settle down until the 28th minute. Our left-back and captain Joakim Rishovd (again deputising for the out-of-form Lübeck) crossed deep into the Hønefoss box to find winger Vegard Somdal. Though Vegard’s header was intercepted by defender Sander Moen Foss, our young midfielder Adil Zahid half-volleyed in the rebound.
Though we led 1-0 at half-time, HBK looked more assured in the second period. Kristoffer Hoven – who scored a hat-trick in this fixture last season – was kept off the scoresheet by the woodwork in the 55th minute. Sadly, Vangen couldn’t quite tip the rebound away, and Walid Idrissi stroked the ball into the net for an equaliser.
Hønefoss hit the post again in the 65th minute, when Idrissi was denied a second goal from a direct free-kick. Hansen managed to clear the loose ball away, but our defending was far from assured in the closing stages.
Had Hoven been in any kind of consistent form, we would surely have lost this match, such were the chances that came his way late on. In the final 16 minutes, he missed the target with THREE shots from inside the box. By full-time, we were very relieved to have come away from the AKA Arena with a 1-1 draw.
One point gained, or two lost? I wasn’t yet sure what to think, but what I did know was that we were three points ahead of the relegation zone with just three games to play. Still lots of work to do.
LYN 1896 vs ROSENBORG 2 (2. divisjon, Avdeling 1 – Match 24)
This match saw Lübeck return to the heart of our defence in place of Vales, who was on international duty with Andorra. I would say that Marc could’ve done with the change of scenery, but… well… [To give you an idea of just how terrible Andorra are, they were thrashed 6-1 by Azerbaijan on the day before this league game.]
Despite being at home, I stuck with the counter-attacking approach that had got us four points from those last two away games. Rosenborg’s reserves didn’t take too well to it, as we went ahead after just 17 minutes. Lyn winger Eirik Haugstad‘s cross came back off RBK left-back Torbjørn Heggem [a distant relative of ex-Liverpool man Vegard Heggem, I believe]. The ball fell to Zahid, whose strike from just outside the box narrowly avoided Lars Jendal on its way into the net.
We then had chances to get into a more comfortable position. Jendal denied our holding midfielder Erik Lundanes Jonvik a rare goal midway through the first half, and an optimistic effort from Trøen grazed the bar. Rosenborg then gave us a potential sign of things to come when Filip Brattbakk’s header narrowly missed the target in the 44th minute.
As expected, RBK fired plenty of shots at us in the second half… but they couldn’t draw blood. Former Norway Under-21s midfielder Marius Lundemo whistled a shot just past the post in the 63rd minute. Six minutes later, it was the turn of first-team winger Pål André Helland – a senior Norwegian international who’s been plagued by injuries in 2020 – to go very close.
The visitors eventually got so desperate in search of a goal that they put three men up front [Cheat Tactic alert!]. They still could not break through, though, as three late saves from Vangen maintained our 1-0 lead and secured just our FOURTH clean sheet of the season. If only we’d defended as bravely as this earlier in the season, when we weren’t battling against relegation!
Not only had that victory blown the title race wide open, but it had also moved us up a couple of places to 10th. We overtook both Eidsvold Turn (who needed a 95th-minute goal to save a draw at Raufoss) and Fram Larvik (who were beaten 3-1 at promotion favourites Nybergsund).
Sadly, we couldn’t put further daylight between us and Egersunds, who ground out a 1-0 home win against Odd 2. Even so, we were looking healthier than we had been only a few weeks earlier. With only the already-relegated bottom two still to play, survival was in our hands.
NEST-SOTRA vs LYN 1896 (2. divisjon, Avdeling 1 – Match 25)
If we won our final away game of the season, and other results went our way, we would secure our safety. That potentially decisive fixture was at the Ågotnes Stadion in Fjell, against a Nest-Sotra side who’d been relegated the previous week. [I guess you could say they Fjell through the trap door! No? Nobody? I’ll get my coat, then.]
Despite already being condemned to the 3. divisjon, Nest-Sotra gave everything in front of their long-suffering supporters. Their passion was obvious, as they had three players cautioned in the first 25 minutes. They would soon be joined in the book by full-back Eirik Bækkelund and our other right-sided Eirik – Haugstad.
Both teams wasted scoring opportunities in the first half. Trøen was caught offside more times than I’d care to mention, while Mehnert hit the post three minutes before half-time. The hosts’ best chance had come in the 26th minute, when Marcus Stueland volleyed a Kristoffer Ryland into the hands of a grateful Vangen.
We gradually turned the screw on Nest-Sotra, only to be frequently denied by brave goalkeeping from Jo Krumsvik. The 20-year-old former Brann trainee held firm until the 74th minute, when Mehnert blew his defence wide open with a 40-yard through-ball to an advancing Trøen. With only Krumsvik to beat, Martin steadied himself before driving in his 13th league goal of this campaign, which matched his haul from last season!
That magnificent breakaway goal would make all the difference. Though Krumsvik stopped Somdal adding a second in stoppage time, we had done exactly what we needed to do. Now it was time to find out whether that was enough to get us out of the relegation picture before the final day.
The final scores from elsewhere gradually came through. Eidsvold Turn left it late to beat Asker 2-1 and stay a single point behind, but the other teams below us didn’t fare so well. Fram Larvik conceded an 88th-minute winner at home to Raufoss and dropped into the bottom three on goal difference behind Egersunds, who’d drawn 1-1 at Bærum. That left the bottom six looking like this…
…which meant that, with a game to spare…
…Lyn were safe! Obviously, that wasn’t something we wanted to celebrate this late in the season, but at least we could go into our final match without any pressure on us.
LYN 1896 vs ØRN HORTEN (2. divisjon, Avdeling 1 – Match 26)
With relegation no longer a concern, I could afford to make a few changes to my starting line-up for this død gummi (that’s Norwegian for ‘dead rubber’). [All credit to Nordan from the SI Community for that cool snippet of information.]
16-year-old prospect Dan Tandberg got a second start at centre-back, with fellow teenager Sandberg making just a third Lyn start in midfield. Goalkeeper Knut-André Skjærstein got one final chance to show he deserved to stay at the Bislett, having been benched for our last eight matches.
This had been a miserable season for Ørn Horten, who were long relegated and simply fighting to avoid finishing bottom. Ørn had won only four league matches up to this point, but three of them had come away from home, so we had to be wary of their counter-attacking threat.
Unsurprisingly, we controlled much of the first half, creating several openings. Sadly, Trøen had gone off the boil – as he tended to do from time to time – and Haugstad was similarly wasteful on the right wing. Eirik even cost us a goal in the 25th minute, when he pushed Ørn goalie Jorge Vieira in the penalty area as defender Daniel Gullteig deflected Hansen’s free-kick into his own net.
The visitors’ other centre-back would find the right target nine minutes later. Petter Svensson was left with a simple close-range tap-in after Kenneth Diallo had chested Portuguese wing wizard Nuninho’s corner in his direction. Skjærstein did catch a late Nuninho header to keep the half-time scoreline at 1-0, but this was not the sign-off we were hoping for.
We were still failing to convert our shots into goals by the 74th minute, when I gave a senior debut to the 17-year-old youth midfielder Rune Bjørshol. Rune showed glimpses of his ability during his cameo, but desperate Dan and the rest of our defence had a rougher time of it. We fell further behind 10 minutes from the break as Diallo sent the ball across our penalty area for Nuninho to finish at the back post.
Our season then ended exactly as it began, with an 82nd-minute Hansen free-kick halving a 2-0 deficit before a late push for an equaliser produced no reward. One particularly frustrating passage of play came in the final minute, when Vieira made two quickfire saves from Zahid and Trøen. I knew right then that it wouldn’t be our day.
And so a disappointing campaign ended on an appropriately sorry note. We did at least stay in 9th place, as Eidsvold Turn only drew 1-1 at Lørenskog and missed the chance to leapfrog us.
Still… 9th place. That’s bottom half. That’s 11 points adrift of Asker in the play-off place, and another four behind champions Nybergsund. That’s really not good enough for a team who were the bookmakers’ pre-season favourites for promotion.
It’s obvious to anyone in the Bastionen where we need to improve in 2021. Though we had the second-strongest attack in the division (behind only Asker, who just missed out on the play-offs), we also had the fourth-worst defence. If you want to challenge for promotion, you need to keep more than SIX clean sheets from 26 matches.
So that’s where this squad needs to be strengthened over the coming months. We’ve got more than enough talent in midfield, and Trøen is one of the most lethal finishers in this division (only Asker’s Papa Sow scored more goals this term). They can’t get us promoted by themselves, though, and their efforts ultimately mean nothing without proper protection from the defence.
Oh yes, and just to confirm, the board have told me that my job is safe. I’ve been offered a new €1,000-per-week contract to serve for another season at the Bislett. If we have another campaign like this one, though, I fear it might be my last.
And that’s a wrap for season 2! Marit’s men left it a bit late, but much to the Bastionen’s relief, Lyn 1896 are staying up for another year in the 2. divisjon!
As much as this season felt torturous at times, and as much as I thought about quitting when things were at their worst, I’m delighted to be able to carry on. This is my most enjoyable save on FM19 so far, and I couldn’t bear the thought of another career ending prematurely.
The 2020 Season Review – in which I’ll look back at a difficult seven months, provide some team statistics, and look ahead to next year – will go live later this week. The 2021 season will begin next Monday, on 1 July.
“Takk for lesing!”
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