71. Didn't know the name but Stoke fans online are taking it hard.
Their story
Guðjón Þórðarson, known to English football fans as Gudjon Thordarson, was an Icelandic footballer and manager who became one of the most successful coaches in his country's history and the man who led Stoke City back to England's second tier. He was born on 14 September 1955 in Akranes, a…
Guðjón Þórðarson, known to English football fans as Gudjon Thordarson, was an Icelandic footballer and manager who became one of the most successful coaches in his country's history and the man who led Stoke City back to England's second tier. He was born on 14 September 1955 in Akranes, a fishing town on Iceland's west coast, and he died on 13 November 2026 at the age of 71.
As a player Guðjón spent his entire career with his hometown club ÍA Akranes, turning out more than two hundred league matches for the side and winning five Icelandic championships and five cup titles. He also represented Iceland once at full international level, in 1985, before retiring from playing in 1986 and moving straight into coaching the following year.
His management career spanned decades in Iceland and Britain. He led KA Akureyri to a surprise and still unique league title in 1989, then returned to ÍA Akranes, where he won five consecutive Icelandic championships between 1992 and 1996. A spell at KR Reykjavik brought two Icelandic Cups, and from 1997 to 1999 he managed the Iceland national team, guiding it to a narrow and memorable near miss against France in qualifying for Euro 2000.
In November 1999 Guðjón took charge of Stoke City after the club was bought by a group of Icelandic investors, bringing several of his countrymen to the Potteries, including his own son Bjarni. Stoke won the Football League Trophy at Wembley in his first season, and after two near misses in the play-offs he finally steered the club out of the third tier in 2002 via a dramatic play-off victory over Cardiff City. He went on to manage Start in Norway, Barnsley, Notts County, Crewe Alexandra and, twice more, ÍA Akranes, before later taking charge of Víkingur Ólafsvík in Iceland's second tier, his final post, which ended in 2022.
Guðjón's three sons, Bjarni, Þórður and Joey Guðjónsson, all became professional footballers, and his grandson Ísak Bergmann Jóhannesson plays professionally today. In August 2023 Guðjón was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, a condition he later spoke about publicly, saying he hoped to recover enough to play golf again. He died at night, having been in poor health for some time, and Icelandic media and football figures paid tribute to a manager widely remembered as one of the most successful and influential in the country's footballing history.
Biography adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and the sources cited on this page; death reported by شبكة تواصل الإخبارية.
In their own words
“I've made a lot of coaches, both current and former. I follow them closely and I enjoy it.”
RÚV interview, September 2026, as quoted by The Sentinel
“I hope I can shake up my body a bit so I can get out and enjoy the good days.”
RÚV interview, September 2026, as quoted by The Sentinel
“I have been better. These are difficult days, weeks and months. There are two things that have been troubling me. On one hand Parkinson's, which I was diagnosed with in 2023, and then I have had back problems. It goes down into my legs and I lose strength.”
RÚV interview, 2026, as quoted by mbl.is (translated from Icelandic)
Photos
1by People Forever
From social media
5Posts by Guðjón, and posts about them, kept here so they are not lost.