Harald Aabrekk

Aabrekk made his debut for Sogndal in 1974 in the Norwegian Second Division (the third tier of Norwegian football). Except for a short spell at SK Brann, where he played a match in the Tippeligaen (the top division) in 1978, he played for Sogndal throughout his career and was a major contributor to their promotion to the Norwegian First Division in 1981. He scored Sogndal's first goal in that division, against Molde in 1982. He played a total of 133 league games from 1973 to 1982, including 22 matches in the First Division in 1982.

Aabrekk started his coaching career in his home county, Sogn og Fjordane, at lower-league clubs Eid, Sandane, and Stryn, before becoming head coach of Sogndal. In 1990, his first season with them, Sogndal was promoted to the Tippeligaen in spite of a 5–0 loss against Bryne in their first home match. He then served as head coach of Tromsø in the Tippeligaen from 1993 to 1995. In 1995, during a match against Bodø/Glimt, Aabrekk tried to stall for time by acting as if he were injured after he was run down by Bodø/Glimt's physiotherapist Truls Karlsen. Although uninjured, he was taken by ambulance to the hospital. In an interview with Verdens Gang, he excused his behavior by saying, "I felt I was lying on the ground a bit too long, and I did not dare to get up so I stayed on the ground. I lay there and was thinking, 'What's going on?' It was not planned, and it was definitely not very smart. I would rather call it a blackout." This episode, according to the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet, was the third worst case of acting in the history of football. Aabrekk later worked for the Football Association of Norway as a coordinator for youth development in Western Norway. He also served as Nils Johan Semb's assistant coach for the Norwegian under-21 team from 1992 to 1998, and when Semb succeeded Egil Olsen as head coach of the Norway national football team in 1998, Aabrekk became assistant coach of the national senior team. At the same time, he worked as Kjell Tennfjord's assistant in…