NUUK, Greenland — This weekend, Greenland’s football team will travel over 6,000 miles for a game. They will swap the snow-covered playing fields of Nuuk, the territory’s capital, for the Brazilian city of Curitiba and hope that their passion for the game will, for a short time at least, remove the distraction of politics and boost their hopes of playing more meaningful games closer to home.
A campaign by the Football Association of Greenland (KAK) to secure membership in Concacaf (Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football) was submitted in May 2024, followed by months of preparation by the KAK to get the application over the finish line. It had been due to reach a crucial, perhaps defining, moment this week, with senior KAK figures invited to Concacaf HQ in Miami to discuss Greenland’s prospects of joining the confederation’s 41 member associations.
After President Donald Trump suggested the U.S. could look to acquire the autonomous Danish territory, negotiations between Greenland and Concacaf (the confederation containing the U.S., Mexico and Canada — next summer’s World Cup hosts) were delayed.
The unexpected rhetoric from President Trump has become a distraction for both the KAK and Concacaf.
“People are asking is it Trump inviting you to the United States,” KAK chief executive Kenneth Kleist told ESPN. “So no, we will meet [Concacaf] later. We are going to meet in London instead, maybe in a month or so, without me going deeper into it than that. It’s become a little bit political, as you can imagine.”
Concacaf declined to comment on Greenland’s application when contacted by ESPN.
Greenland has become a political football at the worst possible time for the KAK. A territory with a population of around 56,000 wants to have a home for its football team. Participation in next week’s Intercontinental Futsal Cup in Brazil — Greenland’s players keep in shape by playing futsal (5-on-5 soccer played indoors on a smaller court) because of the prolonged wintry climate — is a huge moment for the Greenland squad, but what they really want is competitive football, home and away, with the chance, however small, to dream of playing at a World Cup.
“We want to be able to look forward to games, competitive games, in World Cup qualifiers,” said team captain, Patrick Frederiksen. “That’s why we want to join Concacaf.”
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Greenland’s captain explains why they want a place in Concacaf
Greenland captain Patrick Frederiksen joins “The Football Reporters” podcast to explain why he hopes to see his country welcomed into Concacaf.
As an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark, Greenland is technically part of Europe. Although it was granted home rule by Denmark in 1979, Greenland’s people are full citizens of Denmark, the Danish Kroner is the official currency and Danish is spoken alongside Greenlandic. But unlike the Faroe Islands, which is also an autonomous territory of Denmark with home rule of its own since 1948, Greenland’s football association does not have a home.
A clause in UEFA’s regulations stipulating that new member associations must be recognized as a sovereign country by the United Nations means that Greenland cannot join the European confederation. UEFA introduced the rule in 2007, after the Faroe Islands and Gibraltar became members. There is no such requirement with Concacaf. That may change, with an amendment proposed at FIFA’s Congress in Bangkok last May that any new members must be recognized as an independent country by the UN, but the door into Concacaf is still ajar for Greenland.
“When Concacaf responded to our application and invited us for talks, it was like Christmas Day for us,” Greenland coach Morten Rutkjaer told ESPN. “It’s a totally crazy thing that now everyone wants to talk with us and everyone said, “Oh, it’s about Trump.’
“No, no. We have worked on this for many years since I started in 2019. All I know is that we want to be a part of membership somewhere and the best thing for Greenland is to be a part of Concacaf, then the players have something to dream for and train for.”
Karsten Moller Andersen has just gone down, clutching his knee. The Greenland-based members of the national team are training at Nuuk’s indoor Inussivik sports arena, and Andersen is in a bad way. One of his teammates dashes off to seek help from arena staff, returning with a clear plastic bag full of snow. Andersen is moved to a bench and the snow is placed over his knee.
It is an image that sums up the uniqueness of Greenland. The players are training inside because the all-weather surface outside — all-weather, but not Greenland weather — is under three feet of snow. Who needs ice when you have an endless supply of snow to do the same job?
The Greenland players are training for the futsal tournament in Brazil, where they will face the hosts, Afghanistan and Iran. They play futsal for eight months of the year due to the adverse weather conditions outside and they are good: quick, impressive technique and aggressive. Andersen, a Manchester United supporter since Cristiano Ronaldo’s first spell at Old Trafford, is their best player, so his injury is a concern ahead of the trip to Brazil.
“My knee is getting better,” he told ESPN a week later. “I’m getting laser treatment at my physiotherapist, so all good for Brazil.”
Andersen works at an orphanage in Nuuk, as does team captain Patrick Frederiksen. Other members of the team work in banking, fishing and for the Greenlandic government. Midfielder Soren Kreutzmann is a hairdresser. Other members of the team play in Denmark’s second division, the Faroe Islands or Iceland.
“They’re very good football players right now,” Denmark based-coach Rutkjaer said. “And they will only become better when we have the competition to play in. It’s a totally crazy football country. Everyone plays football everywhere. The children are playing on ice, on football fields inside, outside and they talk about football every hour they can.”
To reflect Rutkjaer’s point, while training is taking place at Inussivik, two teenagers sat watching Manchester City versus Real Madrid on their phones. One is an Arsenal supporter, the other a Liverpool fan. When Jude Bellingham scores a late first-leg winner for Real to seal a 3-2 victory in their Champions League playoff clash, there are cheers and laughter from the group that has since surrounded the two teenagers.
But it is the remoteness of Greenland that makes it so difficult for football to develop. There are only 53 miles of road on the island, which measures 2.1 million square kilometers, and just two international flights from Nuuk — to Reykjavik, Iceland, and the Danish capital, Copenhagen — although United Airlines will start a weekly service from Newark to Nuuk this summer. Flight cancellations are a regular occurrence due to high winds and ice on the runway. It’s also not unusual for the flights from Reykjavik and Copenhagen to have to fly back to their destination without landing in Nuuk because of rapid changes in weather conditions.
“We don’t plan too far ahead in Greenland,” said Frederiksen. “We go day-by-day because the weather can change everything.”
Icebergs float around the bay in Nuuk, snow drifts can cover one-story buildings and the weather means that for 8-10 months of the year, football training must be indoors.
“We are covered by snow,” Frederiksen said. “It’s really impossible to play practice football because there is too much snow. It is too deep and the ball will freeze.”
The Greenlandic Football Championship lasts for just one week in August, when the weather cooperates. B-67 Nuuk claimed its 15th national title by winning the 15-game week-long tournament last year, with three teams withdrawing due to transportation difficulties.
It’s clear there is talent and ambition among the Greenland players and senior figures at the KAK. They’ve played men’s friendlies against Kosovo and Turkmenistan in recent years, and Greenland competes in the Island Games, a biennial tournament involving the likes of Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Saint Helena and several tiny European islands. They have also made plans for a friendly game against Tuvalu, the Polynesian island in the south Pacific, later this year to raise awareness of the environmental disaster facing the country.
“Tuvalu is expected to be one of the first islands that will be overflowed with water and Greenland is where the ice cap is melting,” Rutkjaer said. “So the idea is a national match between the two teams to raise publicity about the situation.”
But while futsal tournaments in Brazil and friendly games for the men’s team help give Rutkjaer and his players a sense of purpose, they are nothing compared to the level of excitement that Concacaf would bring for men and women.
Lykke Eldevig, 18, is a star women’s player in Greenland. Her father, Jon, played for B-67, but she has dreams of playing further afield.
“It has always been a dream [to play professionally], but I don’t know if it’s possible,” she told ESPN.
“I train four times a week. Three times with this team and then one time with the regional team. Some youngsters have had to move to schools in Denmark to find teams there and hopefully get into the professional scene, but there’s not many here because we don’t have a lot of opportunities.”
While Lykke speaks, Alice, one of the women training with the senior group, comes across to say how she has played in every women’s Greenlandic Championship since 1988. Nuuk are the reigning champions, winning an 11th title in 2024, taking them to within two titles of the most successful women’s team, I-69, from the city of Ilulissat. She’s still playing football in her mid-50s, the chance of a professional career long gone.
“We really hope that Greenland can join Concacaf,” Alice tells ESPN. “It would open up opportunities for boys and girls in Greenland and be really special for us.”
One awkward thing about their Concacaf application: Greenland doesn’t have a stadium that could host international football games. Nuuk Stadium, adjacent to the Inussivik arena, has an artificial turf pitch and is listed as having a capacity of 2,000, but one side is a rocky hill — covered in snow during ESPN’s visit — and the other backs onto the arena, and the rest is surrounded by houses and apartments. But the application to join Concacaf is part of a plan to develop football and facilities for all sports in Greenland and inadvertently, this is where Trump’s acquisition talk may play in Greenland’s favor.
Investment is needed to build a series of air domes — large, multipurpose sports venues with a roof — that would allow Greenland to stage football fixtures year-round. “There’s a lot of work to do,” said Kleist, CEO of the KAK. “We have no real infrastructure, with cities not connected with the roads and there are a lot of difficulties to be managed, but we have to be positive because we have to do something big in this country. There’s a lot of possibilities for air domes and we are [talking] with the government.”
A snap general election was called earlier this month by Greenland’s prime minister, Mute Bourup Egede, to be held on March 11. The primary issue is not the interest of the U.S. in the territory, but the possibility of reforms and greater investment from Denmark, including upgrades and updates to infrastructure, sporting facilities and health care. Due to a lack of hospitals in Greenland, many patients must be flown to Iceland — a journey of three hours only if weather conditions allow.
There is also a growing independence movement in Greenland, with reports of a possible referendum after the election and a vote on breaking away from Denmark completely. Sources have told ESPN that Trump’s interest in Greenland has put the Danish government under pressure to invest more in Greenlandic projects, including infrastructure and air domes, to avert the prospect of an independence referendum.
Links with Denmark run deep, however. The Danish sportswear manufacturer Hummel has produced Greenland’s new playing strip with the home and away jerseys incorporating traditional Inuit patterns, while the light blue away shirt has been specially designed to match the color of the icebergs around Greenland. In a nod to the social problems on the island — Greenland has a suicide rate six times higher than Nordic countries, according to one study — Hummel has teamed up with UNICEF in a campaign to help deal with mental health issues in the territory.
The sense of change in Greenland is inescapable. Kleist is guarded when it comes to politics talk, making it clear that the KAK are respectful of Concacaf’s process and have no desire to make their application anything but a football matter. But Coach Rutkjaer is clear on Greenland’s ambitions and why Concacaf is the perfect home for Greenland’s aspiring footballers.
“My hope is that we have a national stadium next year with a football field and a roof, then we can train all the year in Nuuk,” Rutkjaer said. “And it’s better that we become a member of Concacaf because our level is much more in line with the Caribbean islands.
“We could play Concacaf Nations League and World Cup qualification, at the preliminary stage, maybe over a period of 14 days, so it’s much easier for Greenland instead of Europe.
“This isn’t about Greenland playing the USA or Mexico, it’s about having the chance to play competitively against nations of a similar level and giving the players a dream to live.”