Veigar Páll Gunnarsson (born 21 March 1980) is a retired

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 ...

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

striker. His transfer in 2011 led to football clubs Stabæk and Vålerenga being nominated for fines of

Norwegian kroner The krone (, abbreviation: kr (also NKr for distinction); code: NOK), plural ''kroner'', is currency of the Kingdom of Norway (including Svalbard). Traditionally known as the Norwegian crown in English. It is nominally subdivided into 100 ''øre ...

500,000 and 350,000 respectively, by a committee (''påtalenemd'') of

Football Association of Norway The Norwegian Football Federation ( nb, Norges Fotballforbund, nn, Noregs Fotballforbund; NFF) is the governing body of football in Norway. It was formed in 1902 and organises the men's and women's national teams, as well as the league systems f ...

— and a police investigation that saw two persons arrested.

Club career

Early years

Veigar Páll made his debut for

Stjarnan Ungmennafélagið Stjarnan, commonly known as Stjarnan, is an Icelandic multi-sports club specialising in handball, football, basketball, volleyball and gymnastics located in Garðabær.and in the top 10 in the World and they have won the League ...

in the 1996 season, in which he only managed one=1 game as a substitute. He established himself as a regular in the side and started scoring goals, catching the eye of foreign teams. He then went abroad to Norway, where he played for

Strømsgodset Strømsgodset is a former municipality in Vestfold county (from 1964 Buskerud county), Norway, today a part of the city of Drammen. History Strømsgodset was originally a small rural annex to the city parish of Bragernes (Drammen). But since th ...

. He failed to establish himself in the first team so he returned to Iceland to play for

KR Reykjavík KR is the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 and WMO country code for South Korea. KR or Kr may also refer to: Sports * KR (basketball club), associated with Knattspyrnufélag Reykjavíkur * Knattspyrnufélag Reykjavíkur, an Icelandic football club * Kickoff r ...

. He quickly became popular with the fans and was the star player of the KR team that won the Icelandic Premier League in 2002 and 2003. In September 2003 he had a trial with

Bolton Wanderers Bolton Wanderers Football Club () is a professional football club based in Horwich, Bolton, Greater Manchester, England, which competes in . The club played at Burnden Park for 102 years from 1895 after moving from their original home at Pike's ...

of the English

Premier League The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...

Stabæk

Veigar joined Stabæk in 2004 in the season they got relegated, after being placed 3rd in the league the previous year. He flourished under new coach

Jan Jönsson Jan Jönsson (born 24 May 1960) is a Swedish football manager and former player. Career Playing career He spent most of his playing career with Halmstads BK. Coaching career Between 1993 and 1994 he was the Sanfrecce Hiroshima assistant coac ...

in 2005, with new signing

Daniel Nannskog Daniel Paul Gustav Nannskog (born 22 May 1974) is a Swedish former professional footballer who played as a striker for Högaborg, Malmö FF, Djurgården, Assyriska, Sylvia, Landskrona BoIS, Sichuan Guancheng and Stabæk IF, as well as for ...

. Veigar was leading the attack with Nannskog, a partnership which was the most feared duo in the league, according to statistics (goals and assist). In the 2006 season, Nannskog became top scorer with 19 goals in Tippeligaen, the

Norwegian top division Eliteserien () is a Norwegian professional league for association football clubs. At the top of the Norwegian football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. Contested by 16 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion ...

, with Veigar finishing one goal behind. In 2007, Stabæk finished second, just behind winners Brann. Veigar played well, and was the seasons assist leader with 17, and fourth on the scoring chart with 15. The following season he made another big contribution to the club, helping them winning the league. Again he was the seasons assist leader with 14, in addition to 10 goals.

Nancy

In December 2008, he signed a contract with the French club

AS Nancy Association Sportive Nancy Lorraine (), commonly known as AS Nancy Lorraine, or simply Nancy, is a French association football club founded in 1967 in Nancy, Grand Est and located in Tomblaine, in the inner suburbs of Nancy. The club currently ...

Ligue 1 Ligue 1, officially known as Ligue 1 Uber Eats for sponsorship reasons, is a French professional league for men's association football clubs. At the top of the French football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. A ...

Return to Stabæk

On 30 November 2009, Stabæk confirmed that Veigar had signed a contract with his former club. Veigar himself stated that he felt that Nancy had destroyed his career by not letting him play, but that he was looking forward to returning "home" to Stabæk.

Vålerenga

On 30 July 2011, Stabæk and

Vålerenga Vålerenga () is a neighbourhood in the city of Oslo, Norway, belonging to the borough of Gamle Oslo. Vålerenga is located between the neighbourhoods of Gamlebyen, Jordal, Ensjø, Etterstad and Lodalen. Vålerenga is in particular known for it ...

reached an agreement, which later led to

controversies Controversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of conflicting opinion or point of view. The word was coined from the Latin ''controversia'', as a composite of ''controversus'' – "turned in an opposite d ...

. Veigar signed a contract with Vålerenga until the end of 2014. After a spell at Stabæk, Veigar returned to his youth-club Stjarnan in 2013, and signed a four-year contract with the club.

International career

Veigar made his debut for

in a January 2001 friendly match against

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

at the Millennium Super Soccer Cup in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. He has been capped 33 times since and has scored six goals.

Career statistics

Honours

Club

KR *

Landsbankadeild The Besta deild karla () is the top level men's football league in Iceland. The competition was founded in 1912 as the Icelandic Championship. Because of the harsh winters in Iceland, it is generally played in the spring and summer (May to Septem ...

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

2003 File:2003 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The crew of STS-107 perished when the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated during reentry into Earth's atmosphere; SARS became an epidemic in China, and was a precursor to SARS-CoV-2; A des ...

Stabæk *

Tippeligaen Eliteserien () is a Norwegian professional league for association football clubs. At the top of the Norwegian football league system, it is the country's primary football competition. Contested by 16 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion ...

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

* 1. divisjon:

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...

Stjarnan * Pepsi-deild karla:

2014 File:2014 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Stocking up supplies and personal protective equipment (PPE) for the Western African Ebola virus epidemic; Citizens examining the ruins after the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping; Bundles of wat ...

References

External links