Sport in Shetland

Shetland's population of around 23,000 is relatively small, but the islands are a burgeoning hub of sporting and fitness activity, with a leisure pursuit for everyone.

People are often stunned by the quality of the sporting facilities around Shetland, including eight leisure centres offering top-rate swimming and dry facilities located throughout the length and breadth of the islands.

Take a ferry to Yell or Whalsay and you’ll find one. A trip to the South, North Mainland or West Mainland? They all have one too.

Climbing walls, gyms, saunas, and indoor halls where you can play sports like badminton, netball and basketball are all on offer, as well as outdoor football pitches at most of the centres.

Lerwick’s Clickimin Centre, the biggest of the facilities, also offers a full-length indoor bowls hall, five squash courts, a quality athletics track and a massive new indoor sports facility – known locally as the 60:40 – which offers footballers, athletes and rugby players the chance to train away from the Shetland cold and damp weather.

With the quality of Shetland’s leisure centres, it’s no wonder that swimming and athletics clubs in the isles are so hugely popular – and producing top talent from the ages of seven and up too.

And the isles’ sporting facilities are set to get even better in the coming months too.

A state-of-the-art all-weather 3G pitch is to be unveiled in Lerwick in summer 2025, which will allow Shetland’s football and rugby teams – both male and female – to train and play competitive games outside all year round for the first time.

It is perfect timing for Shetland’s athletes, who are gearing up for the most exciting summer of sport for Shetland for 20 years.

Hundreds of competitors, coaches and supporters are set to make the short journey from Shetland to neighbours – and friendly rivals - Orkney for July’s NatWest International Island Games in mid-July.

It will be the biggest team Shetland has ever taken to a games, and will see an army of blue bidding to bring back gold, silver and bronze medals to Shetland.

Twelve sports are included in the games, ranging from archery and bowls to swimming and triathlon, with Shetland taking teams for every single one of them.

For some teams, it’s been a long time coming. The Blues, as Shetland's teams are affectionately known, are set to field a women’s football team at the event for the first time since the Shetland games in 2005.

Like Scotland as a whole, football is the primary sport in Shetland. But the women’s game has grown most rapidly over the last decade, going from almost nothing to a vibrant and strong set-up that ranges from youth level right through to a senior team.

Shetland Women have even entered a Highlands and Islands Cup for the first time this year, winning their first match – against rivals Orkney – 5-0.

And the female success doesn’t end there. Shetland’s women’s rugby team, known as the Valkyries, have won their national league title for the past six seasons, beating teams from the likes of Aberdeenshire, Inverness and the Highlands on their way.

In the world of hockey Shetland have become a big name too. The women’s team won the Scottish District Cup for the second time in just three years in April, beating league champions from Edinburgh and Glasgow in the process.

Like almost all of Shetland’s sports clubs, they have a great facility on which to train and play – an all-weather 3G pitch in the village of Brae in the North Mainland, which caters for every game of hockey throughout the summer season.

Men’s football is still the primary attraction in Shetland, though, with players starting at under-five level and carrying on up to the three-tier senior leagues.

Such is the bank of footballing talent in the adult leagues, most clubs have an ‘A’ and a ‘B’ team, effectively their reserves.

Teams are based everywhere from Baltasound in Unst, the most northerly island in Shetland, down to islands such as Whalsay and Bressay, and from Delting in the North Mainland right down to Ness in the south.

Almost every club has their own grass pitch to play on, with Whalsay boasting an all-weather 3G pitch that hosts the inaugural outdoor competition of the year before the grass pitches are even open.

Prefer a more sedate game on the grass? Shetland boasts some of the best golf courses in Scotland, with one golfing YouTuber proclaiming Whalsay’s course as the “best in the world”.

The Asta golf course, near Scalloway, is a good test for novices and golf-lovers alike, while Shetland Golf Club at Dale is a step up in quality and difficulty, and is packed almost every Saturday during the summer for men’s and women’s competitions.

Want something even more sedate? Head to Lerwick’s outdoor bowling green, which sits perfectly in the middle of the picturesque flower park in town.

Shetland boasts some of the best golf courses in Scotland, with one golfing YouTuber proclaiming Whalsay’s course as the “best in the world”.

But what happens when the clocks go back and the Shetland days and nights get shorter, darker and wetter? People head inside to play their sports, of course.

Over the autumn and winter, attentions turn to darts, pool, netball and table tennis, among many others.

Thursday and Friday nights see hostelries up and down the isles taken over by players carrying pool cues and darts cases from September through to March, with Shetland completing an unprecedented county clean sweep over Orkney at the darts boards this year – winning in the men’s A’s and B’s fixtures, and the women’s fixture too.

Netball and table tennis are two of the biggest indoor sports over the colder months, with three netball leagues and as many as six table tennis leagues being contested on a weekly basis.

One sport that Shetland has unexpectedly put itself on the world map in is power lifting.

While home gyms became popular during Covid, Shetland Weight Training Club has been the go-to for any aspiring strongman or strongwoman living in the isles.

The three-floor gym in Scalloway not only offers people the best training equipment, they also provide one-to-one coaching and advice, a lot of which comes from fellow gym users, who are always keen to see their fellow gymgoers better themselves.

Cameron Nisbet was crowned UK’s strongest man in the under-70kg category last April, before finishing second in the world just months later.

And brother and sister duo Dhanni and Shauna Moar have become huge names in the power lifting circuit, scooping national titles and challenging the best in the world.

So from athletics to table tennis, and from bowls to badminton, Shetland is a broad spectrum of sporting talent, thanks largely to the quality of the facilities on offer.

Anyone living here knows how good the facilities are and why Shetlanders are never far from a sporting endeavour.