Our prediction for this World Cup 2026 match:
Buoyed by a hard-fought 1-0 win over Liechtenstein, Armenia will be aiming to give fans yet another reason for celebration when they take on Iceland in Yerevan. Roma ace Henrikh Mkhitaryan remains in the recovery room, but the Armenians are surely capable of matching Iceland, who failed to impress in a 3-0 loss to Germany. Armenia are eyeing their fourth consecutive win in all competitions, but they should be happy with one point from the match.
The Icelanders, on the other hand, failed to spoil Germany’s party in Duisburg. Midfielder Runar Mar Sigurjonsson, who suffered an injury in the opener, is unlikely to feature against Armenia. Anyhow, a close encounter is on the cards at Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium, and we believe that punters can find value in betting on draw. Under 2.5 goals have been netted in each of the previous three meetings between the two sides.
Highlighted Player (David Arshakyan):
David Arshakyan is a Russian footballer who currently plays for Chicago Fire as a striker. Arshakyan was born on August 16, 1994 and he played for local club Smena St. Petersburg during his youth career. On the other hand, he started his professional career with Armenian club FC Mika, but he made no more than three appearances for the Mika Stadium outfit.
The Russian footballer then joined Lithuanian side FK Trakai and he scored 36 goals in 57 appearances for the club in two seasons. On July 28, 2016 he produced probably the best performance of his career as he scored a hat-trick in a victory over FK Utenis Utena. Six days later it was announced that he would join MLS side Chicago Fire on a two-year deal.
Arshakyan made his debut for the club on August 27, 2016, coming as a substitute after 56 minutes. Speaking of his international career, the Chicago Fire attacker debuted for Armenian national team on September 4, 2016 against Denmark.
Highlighted Team (Iceland):
Iceland had little to no success during the first 60 years of entering the FIFA competitions, failing to qualify to a single major tournament in that period, but the team then went on to make tremendous progress at the start of the 21st century.
The Nordic side narrowly missed out on a place at the 2014 World Cup, losing in the play-off to Croatia, but they then enjoyed a thoroughly impressive qualifying campaign to reach the Euro 2016, taking 20 points from 10 matches to leave Turkey and Netherlands trailing in their wake.
As a result, the generation featuring players like Gylfi Sigurdsson, Aron Gunnarsson, Kolbeinn Sigthorsson and Emil Hallfredsson will go down as one of the most successful in the national team history and it could be quite some time before another team repeat their success. Even if he was only used as a bit-part player during the Euro 2016 qualifiers, Eidur Gudjohnsen has got to be mentioned as the first Icelandic footballer to have played for top European sides.