‘Bigger than football’: Norway fans’ Viking row makes waves at World Cup

Norway fans perform the Viking row in the stands during the group stage match against Senegal at New York New Jersey Stadium. Photograph: James Gill/Danehouse/Getty Images View image in fullscreen Norway fans perform the Viking row in the stands during the group stage match against Senegal at New York New Jersey Stadium. Photograph: James Gill/Danehouse/Getty Images ‘Bigger than football’: Norway fans’ Viking row makes waves at World Cup From Times Square to the Norwegian parliament and even in fighter jet cockpits, the choreographed row is everywhere The fans have done it, in their thousands, in the stadiums. The players have done it on the pitch. Pretty much anyone who was there did it in New York’s Times Square . Norwegian MPs did it in parliament . Prince Sverre Magnus, third in line to the Norwegian throne, rowed in an Oslo subway carriage . Care home residents in their 90s rowed in rural Norway and Norwegian Royal Air Force pilots rowed in their F-35 fighter jets. Forget the Icelandic thunderclap that took over the 2016 European championships. The Viking row, the synchronised rowing chant that accompanies the Norwegian football team’s appearances, is the viral phenomenon of the 2026 World Cup. When their team advanced to the last 16 this week, its best World Cup run since 1998, the hordes of jubilant supporters rowing en masse in Oslo and Bergen produced so much sound that seismologists recorded an earthquake . 0:28 Norway's Viking row takes over the World Cup –– video “This is bigger than football,” Norway’s star striker Erling Haaland posted alongside a clip of the squad rowing after their win over Côte d’Ivoire. He told reporters: “Seeing thousands rowing with you, you feel the energy. It gives you goosebumps.” The captain, Martin Ødegaard, who led the squad row with a drum grabbed from the stands, said seeing a whole section of the stadium rowing “makes you realise you aren’t just 11 guys on the pitch – you’re a whole crew. It’s an unbelievable feeling.” The action, which generally starts with the blowing of a Viking horn, involves sitting down as if in a longboat and – to an accelerating drumbeat – drawing an imaginary oar though water while chanting “Ro” (Norwegian for “row”). Unlike most football chants, whose precise origins are often impossible to determine, Norway’s Viking row was consciously devised, carefully rehearsed and massively promoted online. View image in fullscreen Erling Haaland (front) and teammates do the Viking row after Norway’s 2-1 win against Côte d’Ivoire in Dallas. Photograph: Christian Brunskill/UPI/Shutterstock Ole Frøystad, a primary school teacher now proudly known on social media as mr.row.row , came up with the idea after remembering the rhythmic “RO-SEN-BORG” chant that rings round the stadium of the Norwegian football club Rosenborg BK. “Ro”, he thought, sounded just like “row”. From there, it was simple. “I’m like, that’s exactly what the Vikings did. They rowed into battle,” Frøystad – who is staying