Welcome to the Iceland bandwagon. Here’s what you need to know.

The smallest nation at the 2018 World Cup is making big noise. Also, their manager is a part-time dentist.

Af góðu upphafi vonast góður endir.

That is an Icelandic proverb that translates to “A good beginning makes a good ending,” according to Wikiquote.

Ber er hver að baki nema sér bróður eigi.

That’s another one that translates to “Bare is the back of a brother-less man.”

Engum flýgur sofanda steikt gæs i munn.

Here’s one more that roughly means “There will fly no fried goose into the sleeping man’s mouth.”

And those three proverbs tell you a lot about everyone’s new favorite team at the 2018 World Cup: Iceland.

The smallest nation ever to qualify for the World Cup, Iceland had a good beginning with a surprising 1-1 draw against Lionel Messi and Argentina. A team with relatively little star power, Iceland did it together, maintaining composure — and clothed backs — despite having little of the ball (Argentina won the possession battle 77.5 to 22.5 percent, according to ESPN). Two years after breaking onto the international soccer scene with a quarterfinal run at Euro 2016, Iceland didn’t wait for any fried geese, rather it seized its chance and denied Messi his clearest one to earn a historic draw.

Whether you have been thunderclapping for Iceland all along or are just finding a new favorite underdog, here are some of the reasons they are turning it a World Cup darling:

Iceland fans are extremely here for the World Cup

That’s a statistically significant part of Iceland’s population

Gylfi Sigurdsson is Iceland’s biggest star

The Everton midfielder is the rare high-profile star on a roster filled with many players who play professionally in Iceland. He accounts for almost 40 percent of the Iceland squad’s total salary worth, according to The Telegraph.

But Alfreo Finnbogason scored Iceland’s first World Cup goal

The goal was set up by a Sigurdsson effort that was deflected by Argentina goalkeeper Willy Caballero. The ball dropped to Finnbogason, and he tucked it away to make history.

And Iceland fans celebrated, LOUDLY

You might remember the Thunderclap from Euro 2016

Iceland goalkeeper Hannes Halldórsson stopped Messi

With the score tied and one of the greatest players of all time standing just a few strides away, Halldórsson was up to the challenge.

Overall, he held Messi scoreless on 11 shots to earn the draw.

And he did about the same thing to Cristiano Ronaldo in 2016

Oh, he is also a director. Hey, Oscars, prepare for the thunderclap

Iceland manager Heimir Hallgrimsson is still a part-time dentist

While he’s more focused on routes out of the group stage than root canals these days, Hallgrimsson hasn’t totally given up his dental practice in Heimaey despite his soccer success.

“It’s a good way to relax,” Hallgrimsson told The New York Times this year. Despite high winds and a looming snow and ice storm, he was heading home for some delayed dental therapy (for himself). “Some coaches play golf, shoot reindeer, whatever — everybody has something,” he said. “But I really enjoy going back home to my clients.”

He also stops at the pub to talk tactics before home matches

From The Washington Post:

Get this: Hallgrimsson, the manager, shows up at a pub three hours before national home matches. He meets with fans. “He tells us the lineup,” said Sunna Gudrun Petursdottir, the woman in the Viking helmet. “He tells us [the planned] tactics. And there’s total f—— silence. No phones. And nobody has ever posted anything about anything that goes on . . . . It’s a beautiful thing and nobody would ever do anything to ruin that, however f—— drunk you are. You would never compromise it.”

Which makes sense because Iceland has SO MANY coaches

As chronicled by The Guardian in 2016, the rise of Icelandic soccer has been fueled by an investment in training the coaches who teach the game at all levels.

From The Guardian:

At the end of the last century the Icelandic FA put this into practice. Bolstered by the TV money pouring into every Uefa country, Iceland set up an open, hugely popular training scheme. Currently this nation of 335,000 has around 600 qualified coaches, 400 with Uefa B licences, or one per 825 people. To put this into context, in England this number falls to one per 11,000.

The result is a spread of expertise right down to the lowest level. “Here you need a Uefa B licence to coach from under-10 level up and half of the Uefa B licence to coach under-eights,” Dagur Sveinn Dagbjartsson of the Icelandic FA says. This isn’t simply box-ticking. The Uefa B is one step off the level needed to coach a professional team in England. Yelling dads it ain’t.

OK, let’s watch all the Iceland vs. Argentina highlights again

And remember that “Iceland beats Argentina, 1-1”

Perhaps inspired by the iconic Harvard beats Yale 29-29 headline from the Harvard Crimson after a classic 1968 football game, Fox announcer John Strong dropped these memorable words at the final whistle.

Here is Iceland’s remaining World Cup group stage schedule

Iceland earned a crucial point against Argentina, but still faces formidable challenges in Group D.

Nigeria vs. Iceland — Friday, June 22, 11 a.m.

Iceland vs. Croatia — Tuesday, June 26, 2 p.m.