We’ve got a soft spot for Denmark at Sport Witness. The way they qualified for the World Cup despite at one stage looking dead and buried was superb.
Several of the country’s players, such as Pierre-Emile Højbjerg, speak brilliantly about the game. The country’s sport media is generally very good and reliable, and their enthusiasm shines through.
And then there’s the Christian Eriksen to Barcelona obsession.
For what feels like years, we’ve been covering the Danish media taking any old Eriksen to Barca link and running with it. Even when there’s been nothing, they’ve tried their very best to manufacture stories.
Asking the Tottenham player about moving to the club near enough every international break, and clinging to the hope that one day it may happen, it hasn’t been let go.
There’s a reason for this, and it’s not that the Danish media want to annoy Spurs. Great Danish footballers and Barca have a link. Everyone knows about Michael Laudrup, but before him there was Allan Simonsen, and it’s rightly left a mark.
So when Barca were keen on Eriksen as a youngster, the dream was born… here was the next great Dane to play for the Catalan club.
Obviously, that’s all on the front page of Ekstra Bladet’s sport section today. The first sentence makes it clear the move would be a ‘dream’ for Danish football fans.
But the last sentence is: ‘He will certainly not be cheap, so it indicates that FC Barcelona deselects Christian Eriksen, who, in turn, can look forward to both CL participation and a wage increase when returning to Tottenham after the World Cup.’
The dream is dying.
Eriksen himself was in Middelfart yesterday (stop laughing, it’s where he’s from) playing a game of football with some locals, like the ultra nice guy he is, and was asked about the reports.
“They’ve not called, it’s just rumours,” Fyen quote him as saying.
So is that it, no more Danish media Eriksen to Barcelona craze? We doubt it, and sincerely hope not. There’s nothing wrong with a dream.
