The new life of the World Cup beauty Rurik Gislason

He received the bill a few weeks after the World Cup in Russia, after which almost everything changed for him in a very short space of time. “It was a little crazy,” he says. Almost a year later, when training with German second division team SV Sandhausen, you wouldn't realize that the 31-year-old is a star on social media. It's the end of June and one of the first sessions in preparation for the new season, the sun is beating down on the grass field at the edge of the forest, a few pensioners have made themselves comfortable in the shade of the small stand. In terms of football, Gislason doesn't particularly stand out among his teammates. However, what sets him apart from the others is his Instagram profile.

From 40.000 to 1 million followers Almost a million people follow him on the social network, more than a hundred times as many as left-back Leart Paqarada. It started a year ago when the Icelandic international was substituted on in the preliminary round game against Argentina at the World Cup. Even during this short stint, Gislason didn't stand out because he scored a hat trick or something else spectacular, but rather because of his appearance: "Huh, he's beautiful!" was the headline in the "Tagesspiegel", for example.

Gislason's Instagram star rose at the 2018 World Cup. © AFP / FRANCISCO LEONG

Just seven days later, the number of his followers had increased from almost 40 to over a million. “What happened this week was overwhelming. It took me time to understand it,” says Gislason today. A lot more happened afterwards: He was often asked to be a model, his face was printed on the cover of glamor magazines and Gislason fans even came to small Sandhausen from Argentina, Russia and Switzerland. The offensive player gave away so many of his jerseys that he far exceeded the quota provided by the club. A personal hashtag “Maybe I was too nice. I was asked on the street, after training, after games. “People don’t know that we footballers have to pay for the jerseys ourselves,” he says. Following the hype following his Argentina appearance, one of his teammates gave him the hashtag #sexyrurik, which became a hit online. Everyone wanted something from him: fans his jerseys, women his attention, magazines his photos.

The Icelander is a sought-after model.

It was difficult to concentrate on the daily work in Sandhausen shortly after the World Cup, he says. The then SVS coach Kenan Kocak, who experienced him both before and after the World Cup, says: “Of course it was the first time he went through something like that. It's not easy for a person to deal with that.” He also had to pay attention to the mood in the team because Gislason had “suddenly come back as a star”. Even today, the Icelander sometimes earns more per month with Instagram than with SVS, as he says. The situation was new not only for Kocak and Gislason, but for the entire SV Sandhausen. After a photo with a friend, the number of followers fell Hardly any other club represents the provincial nature of German professional football as much as the SVS. 14 residents live in the town near Heidelberg, which is not even a city but a municipality, as the club spokesman emphasizes. The contrast to his second life, which emerged for Gislason on the Internet during the World Cup, could hardly have been greater. A little more than six months after his return, the number of his followers fell back to just under a million. “It became less when I started posting pictures of my girlfriend,” he says, his mouth twisting into a smile: “I don’t know why.”

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The new life of the World Cup beauty Rurik Gislason

The moment when his new life went to his head came with a reckoning for Rurik Gislason. When the Icelander saw how much money he had given away his number nine jerseys to fans for, he realized: “I have to take a step back to protect myself.”

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