Garðar Bergmann Gunnlaugsson (born 7 September 1983) is an

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who plays for ÍA Akranes in the Úrvalsdeild karla. He is the younger brother of

Arnar Gunnlaugsson Arnar Bergmann Gunnlaugsson (born 6 March 1973) is an Icelandic football coach managing Víkingur in the Úrvalsdeild. He is a retired international player. During his career he enjoyed spells at Leicester City, Stoke City, Bolton Wanderers, ...

and

Bjarki Gunnlaugsson Bjarki Bergmann Gunnlaugsson (born 3 March 1973 in Akranes) is a retired Icelandic professional footballer who last played for FH. Club career After a period in English football at Preston North End FC, Bjarki joined up with his twin br ...

Club career

Garðar was born in

Akranes Akranes () is a port town and municipality on the west coast of Iceland, around north of the capital Reykjavík. The area where Akranes is located was settled in the 9th century; however, it did not receive a municipal charter until 1942. His ...

in western Iceland in 1983. He started his football career playing for his local team ÍA Akranes before moving to

Valur Valur may refer to: People * Birkir Valur Jónsson (born 1998), Icelandic football player * Björn Valur Gíslason (born 1959), Icelandic politician * Guðjón Valur Sigurðsson (born 1979), Icelandic handball player * Guðni Valur Guðnason (born ...

in 2004. In 2007, he signed with Swedish club

IFK Norrköping Idrottsföreningen Kamraterna Norrköping, more commonly known as IFK Norrköping or simply Norrköping, is a Swedish professional football club based in Norrköping. The club is affiliated to Östergötlands Fotbollförbund and play their ...

before moving, in August 2008, to Bulgarian side

CSKA Sofia CSKA Sofia ( bg, ЦСКА София) is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia and currently competing in the country's premier football competition, the First League. ''CSKA'' is an abbreviation for ''Central Sport ...

. He signed a three-year contract at Sofia, becoming the first Icelandic footballer to play in the

Bulgarian A PFG The First Professional Football League ( bg, Първа професионална футболна лига, Parva Profesionalna Futbolna Liga), also known as the Bulgarian First League or Parva Liga, currently known as the efbet League for spon ...

when he made his debut in a match against

PFC Pirin Blagoevgrad PFC Pirin Blagoevgrad was a Bulgarian professional association football, football club based in Blagoevgrad. History Makedonska slava Club was founded in 1928 as Makedonska Slava ("Macedonia (region), Macedonian Glory"). In 1948 the club joined ...

. On 18 January 2010, Garðar officially terminated his contract with CSKA Sofia before signing for Austrian side

LASK Linz Linzer Athletik-Sport-Klub, commonly known as Linzer ASK () or simply LASK, is an Austrian professional football club, from the Upper-Austrian state capital Linz. It is the oldest football club in that region, and plays in the Austrian Football ...

in February 2010, making his debut for LASK in April due to groin injuries. In July 2010 Garðar signed a 2-year contract with German side

SpVgg Unterhaching Spielvereinigung Unterhaching () is a German sports club in Unterhaching, a semi-rural municipality on the southern outskirts of the Bavarian capital Munich. The club is widely known for playing in the first-division association football league B ...

, but left the club after one year, returning to ÍA Akranes where he had begun his career. In November 2018, Garðar signed with

. In August 2019, he announced that he would miss the rest of the

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...

due to a

slipped disc Spinal disc herniation is an injury to the cushioning and connective tissue between vertebrae, usually caused by excessive strain or trauma to the spine. It may result in back pain, pain or sensation in different parts of the body, and physic ...

in his lower back and that it was unlikely that he would continue his football career. In June 2020, Gunnlaugsson returned to the pitch, after signing with 2. deild karla side Kári. In May 2020, 39-year old Gunnlaugsson signed with his former club, ÍA Akranes, in the top level men's football league in Iceland.

International career

Garðar has played for Iceland U-19 and U-21 but did not make his debut for the senior team until 13 January 2016 in a friendly against

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

Personal life

He was married to model Ásdís Rán Gunnarsdóttir with whom he has a daughter and a son. They divorced in 2012.

References

External links