Hákon Valdimarsson: Dark Horse
Hákon Valdimarsson: Dark Horse Most Brentford fans might assume that, as a 23-year-old goalkeeper, Hákon Valdimarsson’s penalty save against Colchester United on his Bees debut in the Carabao Cup second round might be one of the biggest moments of the youngster’s career. But, when you consider he made his senior debut aged just 15, played an integral part in one of the most surprising seasons in Icelandic football history, featured in the craziest title-decider in Swedish football history, and kept out both Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Kane - two of the greatest strikers in football history - that spot-kick stop in Essex might not even make the top 10. All of that comes having started his goalkeeping career a few months after his 14th birthday, having quit football two years earlier, with other hobbies more appealing at the time.
And those pastimes imply that Valdimarsson has always been good with his hands, with his fingertips initially put to use by moving bishops and knights around a board, before they were tipping balls around a post. He reveals: “I started playing chess in the first grade. I remember I won a tournament in the first or second grade, in primary school.
“It started just from being in school; we would finish our studies and go and play chess. “The pressure of chess isn’t the same as the pressure of a football game - I never got nervous when I played chess! “I was playing football and handball alongside chess when I was very young.
I quit football when I was 13 - I wasn’t a goalkeeper at that point - and played handball. “It’s a lot of contact - and a lot of fighting! It’s completely different to football.
“I played in a midfield position so it’s not really similar to being a goalkeeper, to be honest. But some of the skills I used then I also use now. “Throwing, for example: sometimes when I throw the ball in football, I throw it like I used to in handball, where you use your shoulder, rather than bowling it out.
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