It was a solid start of the campaign from a pretty unremarkable Lillestrøm side as they lost just one of the first eight games in the league and surprised good sides like Odd and Sarpsborg. Their man of the moment early on was striker Fred Friday as he scored a number of good goals and carried the team pretty much on his shoulders. There was little else to get excited about in this team as they focused on keeping tight and compact and making the most of any chances. The defence was marshalled by veteran Frode Kippe while Malaury Martin was tasked with giving the team a bit of creativity from midfield. Runar Kristinsson started to lose his grip of the team from the halfway point of the season as results and performances began to deteriorate and he just did not have the answer to the problems. The Canaries suffered five losses in a run of six games as they started to feel the heat of the relegation places. Some shocking defensive displays made them suffer losses to teams of their calibre like Tromsø, Aalesund and Stabæk and the manager was now boxed into a corner and trying to avert a crisis. The sale of Friday to AZ was a major blow to the attack and Erling Knudzon was tasked with bringing the goals to stop the rot, something that he struggled to do. The players in all departments were struggling and in poor form as Arnold Origi was shocking on goal, the midfield was being constantly overrun and the wingers were hardly delivering too. Indeed, Lillestrøm went on a quite dreadful run of just a single loss in 15 games and Kristinsson seemed to be a man in borrowed time from August onwards. He averted the first real threat of sacking by getting three draws in consecutive games but then two more losses sealed his fate and the experienced former coach Arne Erlandsen was brought in to save the team for the final six games, with Lillestrøm sitting in the bottom two and lacking any sort of confidence. Even if he lost his first game in charge, the new man gave the squad lots of belief and instilled mettle that eventually carried them to safety as two huge wins in a row lifted them off the bottom before a 1:0 win over Molde on the final day sealed safety. Thus, a traumatic season eventually reached a happy ending but the club needs to have a much better approach next season to avoid such dramas again.
