Viking Held Bayern Munich in Their First Champions League Night in Stavanger
Viking drew with Bayern Munich on the night Champions League football came to Stavanger, recovering from three goals down after Michael Olise's red card. The Norwegian club, Norwegian champions for the first time in 34 years in 2025, were eight years removed from a 5-0 second-tier defeat to a club that no longer exists.
- Competition: Champions League league phase
- Venue: Stavanger
- Result: Draw on the night against Bayern Munich
- Key moment: Michael Olise sent off; Viking seized the moment
- What's next: Trips to Aston Villa, Atletico Madrid and Napoli still to come
- Stakes: Viking and Bodo/Glimt level on points in the Norwegian title race with seven games remaining
What was said
"That was the moment. You are preparing for wave after wave, maybe having a counter-attack or two, and then you score from the first corner."
"You can always score early. But that was something that we had never dreamed of. It was crazy. More than we could expect. It was just a night for the history books."
"It was the biggest game in our club's history. The most important learning is that we can actually compete. We can actually cope with the tempo."
"But he is our scumbag. We love him."
"I have dreamed about this since I was five years old. I played for the club from the age of seven and I never experienced this as a player. It is kind of a dream to win the league and to now represent Viking in the Champions League. This is my hometown club and it means everything. It is the proudest time of my life."
"The low point was losing 5-0 against a team called Nest-Sotra. That club does not exist anymore."
"We realised that we were bad. Something needed to change."
"We use our academy and have homegrown players. We also have people in leadership roles who love the club and want to do well, people who have a passion for the town and have been around the club for a long time."
"Players can come and go. But the culture that we have created is massive."
"Regardless of what people think or what the natural thing to do is, we need to ask ourselves what the best decision is for Viking. We genuinely thought it would make us better."
"It was bold to do it that way. It was a gamble. But we were pretty sure we had to do something different to everyone else. It worked. Now, we almost cannot see another solution."
"Financially, it is a different world. It gives you a very solid foundation, more freedom and security. It also gives you the possibility to sign different kind of players."
"We will definitely look at our facilities, our training ground, our stadium. We want Viking to be strong 100 years from now. What decisions can we make now to ensure that the next generation will have the opportunity to keep developing the club?"
"The biggest danger in football is that you lose yourself very quickly because you are looking for success all the time. There are a lot of examples of that happening at bigger clubs."
"Everything. We spend all the time we have trying to make the club better. When you see so many kids with Viking jerseys around the city, this is what it is about. It is bigger than life in so many ways."
"We have been there when it was very dark so we know that it is a rollercoaster. We are just looking forward to the rest of this journey."
The two men who run Viking give the clearest picture of why the Bayern result was not a fluke of noise. Bjorno talks about competing and coping with tempo; Nevland describes a club that went from accepting it was bad to building a culture bigger than any individual player. The quotes are not romantic generalities — they are the blueprint of a club that has had to solve a structural problem in Norwegian football.
Nevland's defence of Zlatko Tripic after Max Eberl's "scumbag" remark is the tell. Viking's captain is the kind of player who irritates opponents into mistakes, and Olise's red card came from exactly that kind of friction. The Bayern board's reaction was a compliment delivered as an insult.
The numbers
- 5-0: Viking's record defeat in the second tier against Nest-Sotra
- 274: spectators who watched that 5-0 loss in June 2018
- Four goals: Viking trailed by that margin before the end of the first half that day
- One point: the margin by which Viking were promoted
- 34 years: the wait for the 2025 Norwegian title
- Seven games: remaining in the current Norwegian season, with Viking and Bodo/Glimt level on points
- Three trips: Aston Villa, Atletico Madrid and Napoli still to come for Viking
Why Viking's joint-coach gamble is the model Premier League clubs should study
The arrangement is simple: Bjarte Lunde Aarsheim and Morten Jensen share the head coach role. Both know the club intimately — Aarsheim played for Viking for years and Jensen was on the books as a teenager. That shared history is not decoration. It means decisions on recruitment, style and dressing-room discipline do not restart every time an outsider arrives with a different plan.
Bjorno's framing is the most interesting part: "Regardless of what people think or what the natural thing to do is, we need to ask ourselves what the best decision is for Viking." Most clubs copy what works elsewhere because it looks safer. Viking measured the risk differently and concluded a shared structure fitted their resources and their culture. Nevland admits it was a gamble, but the result is that Viking cannot now imagine another solution.
The playing-side evidence is in the Bayern comeback. A team managed by committee is often sold as indecisive; here it produced a side that stayed organised through wave after wave, held a counter-attacking threat, and then took the chance when Olise was sent off. Michael Olise and Zlatko Tripic were the two figures at the centre of the night's flashpoint. Below the surface, the academy and homegrown players are the reason Viking could afford the temperament to do something different.
Talking points
- Joint-coaches look like a gimmick to English eyes, but Viking's stability suggests continuity in leadership might beat the hire-and-fire cycle for mid-sized European clubs.
- Should the Bayern result be framed as Viking competing, or as Bayern letting a three-goal lead slip? Both readings say something uncomfortable about top-tier concentration.
- Champions League money could turn Norway into a two-club league — Viking and Bodo/Glimt are already level on points with seven games left, and the cash gap grows.
- Eberl calling Tripic a "scumbag" handed Viking motivation. Is that a Bayern problem or a compliment to a captain doing his job?
What happens next
Viking still have trips to Aston Villa, Atletico Madrid and Napoli in the Champions League, three fixtures that will test whether they can cope with tempo away from Stavanger. Domestically, they are level on points with Bodo/Glimt with seven games remaining as they chase a first title retention in over 50 years. The twin pressures are real: the Champions League fixtures are the glamour, but the Norwegian title is the foundation.
Frequently asked questions
Did Viking beat Bayern Munich?
No — Viking claimed a draw on the night against Bayern Munich in their first Champions League home game in Stavanger. Bayern had turned the game around with three goals of their own before Michael Olise was sent off.
Who is Erik Nevland?
Erik Nevland is Viking's sporting director and a former Norway international who left Viking as a teenager to join Manchester United, later playing for Fulham. He played for Viking in four stints and has supported the club since childhood — his mother also worked for the club.
Why did Max Eberl call Zlatko Tripic a scumbag?
Max Eberl of the Bayern board was so ruffled by Zlatko Tripic's part in Michael Olise's red card that he made headlines describing the Viking captain as a "scumbag". Erik Nevland responded that the captain is Viking's scumbag and that they love him.
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