'We want to beat each other, but we don't hate each other'
On July 12, 1908, on Balder's Hage (pasture) in Gothenburg, Sweden and Norway played their first international football match. Their opponents, naturally enough, were each other.
Tomorrow, 95 years, six months, 10 days and 101 matches later, Hong Kong Stadium provides by far and away the most unusual backdrop for the renewal of one of the world's least deadly local rivalries.
The Swede's inaugural 11-3 victory set something of a tone for the next 100 years - they've won twice as many games as the Norwegians and scored nearly twice as many goals.
Seven time zones away from Scandinavia, tomorrow's Carlsberg Cup encounter might be the latest episode in a long-standing tradition, but it certainly won't be fuelled by the hatred, or the distant or not-so-distant memory of more deadly combat that often fuels the great football derbies.
'There isn't really a rivalry, it's a friendliness,' said Norway's assistant coach, Stig Inge Bjornebye. 'When Sweden play in the World Cup all the Norwegians are supporting them. We have never really had any political difficulties and there's no religious conflict either. That seems to start a lot of the trouble in the world.'