Ståle Solbakken

Early clubs

Solbakken, a midfielder, started his career in Norway, playing for his local lower league team Grue. After five seasons with Grue, he moved to HamKam, a then-second tier club, in 1989. He was the club's top goalscorer in the 1990 season, where he netted nine times. The following season he scored 14 goals to help the club to promotion to the top-flight Norwegian Premier League. After narrowly avoiding relegation in his first season at the top level, Solbakken was part of the HamKam side that finished fifth in 1993 – a position they have not bettered since.

Lillestrøm

In 1994, he transferred to their Premier League rivals Lillestrøm where he finished as runner-up in the league during his first season. Although the club finished in fourth during the following campaign, Solbakken's performances saw him win the Kniksen award as the Norwegian Midfielder of the Season. He was appointed club captain by Lillestrøm and helped the side again finish runners-up in 1996 before he serving one final season in 1997 for the Canaries. In total, he made 99 league appearances for the club, scoring 34 times.

Moves abroad

In October 1997, Solbakken joined English Premier League club Wimbledon for £250,000. In his six league games for Wimbledon, Solbakken scored one goal against West Ham United and was twice named "man of the match", but he fell out with team manager Joe Kinnear and was banned from club training shortly thereafter. Solbakken was quickly sold…

Solbakken made his international debut for the Norway national team on 9 March 1994 in a 3–1 friendly win in Wales. Although he was not named in the squad for the 1994 World Cup, he became a regular feature in the squad soon after. He was a member of the Norwegian team that qualified for 1998 World Cup, where he appeared in two of their group games (against Morocco and Scotland) as well as their second round exit to Italy. His country qualified for the next major tournament, the 2000 European Championship, but Solbakken picked up an injury shortly before the finals. In the end, he was only able to appear in one tournament game: a goalless draw with Slovenia that eliminated them in the group stage. After this exit, he announced his international retirement, aged 32. In total, Solbakken earned 58 caps for Norway, scoring nine times.

International goals

Scores and goals list Norway's goal tally first

Ham-Kam

In 2002, Solbakken returned to Norway and started his managerial career at his old club HamKam, positioned at the second tier. He had great success at HamKam, as the club won the league and was promoted to the top-flight Tippeligaen. His "resurrection", and the "salvation" (i.e. promotion) of HamKam, earned him the nickname "Ståle Salvatore", often cited in Norwegian press since. The next season, Solbakken managed HamKam to a fifth place in the Tippeligaen 2004 season, and he won the 2004 Kniksen award as Norwegian Manager of the Year. In late 2005, Solbakken was named as new manager of another of his former clubs, Copenhagen.

Copenhagen

In his first years at the club, Solbakken guided Copenhagen to the 2006 and 2007 Danish Superliga championship, as well as the 2006 Royal League trophy. He managed Copenhagen through to the group stage of the 2006–07 UEFA Champions League, after beating Ajax in the final qualifying round on 23 August 2006. Copenhagen finished last in its group, though they won a meriting 1–0 victory against later semi-finalists Manchester United. In May 2009, Solbakken led Copenhagen to the Double of both the 2009 Danish Cup and the 2009 Superliga championship, the seventh championship in club history. On 3 November 2009, it was announced that he would not renew his contract which ended on 30 June 2011. Instead, he agreed a letter of intent to become Norway national team manager either in January 2012 or after the Euro 2012, should…

His son Markus Solbakken is a footballer, who made his debut for the Norwegian national team under his father's management in 2023.