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Just how much hate does the Faroe Islands derby generate?

Among the big derbies in the Premier League, the Merseyside derby is often described as "the frie...



Just how much hate does the Fa...
Soccer

Just how much hate does the Faroe Islands derby generate?

Among the big derbies in the Premier League, the Merseyside derby is often described as "the friendly derby".

But it probably doesn't come close to the Faroe Islands derby between Torshavn sides B36 and HB.

United We Stand fanzine editor Andy Mitten attended a derby match between both of those teams as part of his book Mad for it: From Blackpool to Barcelona: Football's Greatest Rivalries which he spoke to us about on this week's Team 33.

Andy chatted to us about going to classic derbies like Argentina's Superclasico, El Clascio, the Istanbul derby, Belgrade's one and the Ajax-Feyenoord derby, but the tiny Faroe Islands is certainly unique in that regard.

"The Faroe Islands was the only place where I got stuck for an interview," Andy told us.

"I was going to meet a captain of one of the teams but he went into a sulk because his team lost 6-0 and refused to meet me. That became part of the story.

"But that was the only place where I couldn't find anyone to say a bad word about the other team. Their argument was 'there's only 40,000 of us, so we have to get on. There is no alternative because there's so few of us, we can't fall out with each other'. At about 3 o'clock in the morning, when one of them had had a few beers, he came up to me and said 'can I have word?' Then, he said 'occasionally we accuse [our rivals] of being a little bit arrogant' and that was as strong as it got. Whereas if you're asking Rangers fans of what they thought of Celtic or Feyenoord fans what they think of Ajax fans, it was far, far stronger than accusing them of being 'a little bit arrogant.'"

And it was certainly calmer than the story Andy told us about the experience of hanging out with fans in Serbia before the "dangerous" Belgrade derby. 

You can listen to the full interview on the podcast player or stream on iTunes:

You can also get in touch with the show via Twitter:

 

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