Bodo/Glimt's rise from washing kit at home to facing Tottenham in Champions League

In some respects, Bodo/Glimt's journey to the league phase of the Champions League might seem miraculous, yet in others it feels entirely inevitable. The first Norwegian club to reach the Champions League proper in nearly 20 years are also the northernmost team to ever get this far, though it's something they've been working towards for quite some time.

During the 2021/22 campaign, they demolished Jose Mourinho's Roma 6-1 in a Conference League group encounter, ultimately progressing to the quarter-finals of that tournament and falling short against the same opponents. Last term, meanwhile they overcame heavyweights Olympiacos and Lazio on their path to the Europa League semi-finals.

They lost to Spurs on that occasion, but this evening their Aspmyra Stadion home - the tiniest venue in this season's Champions League with a capacity of slightly more than 8,000 - hosts Spurs once more. Scarcely ten years ago, however, circumstances appeared vastly different.

Håvard Sakariassen, the club's former player and current sporting director, joined the backroom team upon hanging up his boots in 2011 and encountered a completely different situation to what exists today. "It was a completely different club than today because we were almost bankrupt, we didn't have a kit manager," Sakariassen told the Mirror. "We had to fire the kit manager because we couldn't afford him... so we actually washed our training gear at home and we came ready to to go to practice.

"Then you have to do everything, you know, you have to be the kit manager, you have to arrange the trips, you have to be a part of everything, including what I do now. So I think the knowledge of the holistic part of the football club is somehow good to have. Then you have respect for the the roles of everyone. and you see that everyone, everything has to come together.

"We have a quarter-final in Conference League, we have a semi-final and Europa League. So it is weird because when we qualified for Champions League, I can say that I felt like, 'okay, yeah [this makes sense]'. Because it was weird, but it kind of felt well-deserved too.

"It's weird because I know the story of the club and I know where we were 10 years ago. But also we've done a good job in the last years. So we kind of felt also that we deserve this opportunity."

Bodo/Glimt's isolation might appear daunting for some - Bodo sits nearly 2,000 miles from London and it will take you hundreds of miles and plenty of time to travel there from Norway's capital Oslo - yet those within the club view it as an advantage, at least in some respects. For one, it ensures the players they can attract will sign for the proper motivations, with considerable effort invested behind the scenes to guarantee everyone represents both a cultural and tactical match.

In a footballing landscape dominated by multi-club models and international partnerships, Sakariassen cherishes another secret weapon - the principle of Vårres Måte, which roughly translates to 'our way'. "If we try to copy something, we're just gonna be a bad copy of something," he asserts. "If we... should have any chance to become something unique and to get the potential out of the club, we have to do it our way."

Over time, Bodo/Glimt has been able to highlight significant success stories, bolstering their reputation. A prime example is Albert Gronbaek, who transitioned from warming the bench at Aarhus to moving to Norway in 2022, and within two-and-a-half years, emerged as a full international and ultimately, Bodo/Glimt's record sale.

Suddenly, players who might have previously hesitated about such a distant move were starting to embrace it. The club has also recruited wisely from within Norway, and one of those players - defender Jostein Gundersen - is under no illusions about the factors that have enabled the team to flourish.

"We have a unique culture here, everyone goes in the same direction. Everyone wants to take the next step," Gundersen shares. "We are living far north in Europe, but we have a unique togetherness and culture that makes it a special place to play football in."

Gundersen, 29, featured in every minute of the knockout rounds during last term's Europa League campaign and was handed a starting berth in the opening league phase fixture of this season's Champions League. Bodo/Glimt found themselves 2-0 down away to Slavia Prague with merely 15 minutes remaining but refused to surrender, securing a dramatic equaliser in the dying moments through substitute Sondre Brunstad Fet.

He regards Spurs as the finest opposition they encountered last term, yet believes the Norwegians possess the capability to trouble any visiting side to Bodo this campaign. That encompasses the Europa League holders, alongside Monaco, Juventus and 2023 Champions League victors Manchester City.

"⁠I think it might be a challenge to come here for a lot of teams," Gundersen adds "It's probably not the sexiest stadium for the world class players that are coming here.

"For our sake we just want to improve every single day, and that has now taken us to the Champions League. We are here to perform, and we feel like we deserve to be here. You can tell by walking in the city that the whole city and region is proud to be here, and that makes us proud."

As sporting director Sakariassen takes a step back and assesses the period preceding Spurs' arrival, he observes - with a grin - that autumn is approaching. He's an individual who relishes the pronounced seasons experienced in Bodo, which is precisely what you'd anticipate from someone who was raised 100 metres from the ground and now resides even nearer, though he also appreciates the contrasting rhythm of life compared to the home cities of some of the Champions League's bigger hitters.

"For me it's much better to live in Bodo and travel to London for a weekend," he says. "Because if you like to you have the city and you have all the good life, but you also have insane nature around you. The freedom you feel here.

"The nature around here is amazing. The life here is really easy because you can move from A to B, you don't spend any time in the traffic of your life in Bodo,. and that has value. If you start for two hours every day in traffic, then you waste a lot of your life."

It's perhaps this straightforward mentality which shapes Bodo/Glimt's perspective on their European adventures. There's been excitement throughout the town due to the Champions League, perhaps slightly more than previously, but up there Vårres Måte means accepting things as they unfold rather than fantasising about glory and having to readjust expectations.

"When we kind of started this journey five years ago, there was, we didn't have a plan of coming here," Sakariassen says. "[In football] you can make all these great plans and it takes two two months or one year and you can toss it in the bin.

"So it's a fact of football, I think, and it's probably a fact of life that the best way of working is actually doing it day by day and grab all the momentums that you can have along the way and just try to improve everything all the time. And suddenly you know, tomorrow, maybe there's the door open I was not open today, and then if it's smart to go in that door, you go in."