As teams around Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania kick their pre-season into gear, we are beginning to see some exciting friendlies with, perhaps, some unexpected results. The headline match of this batch of friendlies was, without a doubt, the clash of Latvian and Lithuanian Champions – FC RFS versus FK Žalgiris.
FK Kauno Žalgiris 2-0 FK Panevezys
A local, Lithuanian friendly saw a team from Kaunas convincingly get a win over a struggling Panevėžys side. Jonas Bičkus scored in the 35th minute and Valdas Paulauskas doubled the lead at the beginning of the second half. Bičkus had previously played college soccer in the USA while Paulauskas was a star forward for Banga, with whom he lifted the Lithuanian cup last season, and joined Kaunas only two days ago.
BFA Vilnius 2-3 FC Hegelmann
Lithuanian cup runner-ups Hegelmann struggled to a narrow win against a second division team, BFA Vilnius, with a player on trial and Martin Perveinis scoring for the home side and Esmilis Kausilis, Abdek Njoya, and Yanis Azouazi for Hegelmann. Hegelmann were in the lead 2-0 and then 3-1, but a late goal from Perveinis injected a small dose of welcome uncertainty about the final result into the game.
FK Sūduva 1-0 DFK Dainava Alytus
This “South Lithuanian Derby” (the two cities being only 56km apart) saw Marijampole side take on Dainava from Alytus. Sūduva’s new signing Nauris Petkevičius scored the only and winning goal of the game in the first half.
FK Liepāja 2-0 FK Džiugas Telšiai
In the first of two international friendlies, Liepāja enjoyed a 2-0 win over Džiugas with Roberts Meļķis scoring the first goal after an assist by his brother Rūdolfs. Stefan Purtic scored the second goal.
Finally, FK Žalgiris 0-1 FC RFS
A somewhat underwhelming result for a game between the Champions of Latvia and Lithuania, each of whom has experience of European football. Stefan Panic scored the only goal of the game from a penalty kick in the 41st minute and, disappointingly for Žalgiris, Sergejs Vilkovs saved a penalty in the second half, keeping the score 1-0. Last time Žalgiris got the better of RFS in a friendly was in 2019, when the green-whites won 3-2.
This was the second friendly fixture for RFS this pre-season, first being a 2-1 loss to Estonian Nõmme Kalju. RFS are hosting Ajax in the final home fixture of the Europa League at Daugava Stadium in Riga on the 23rd of January.
Some other games that were played, included:
- FK Metta 10-1 SK Skanste
- FK Riteriai 1-1 BFC Daugavpils
- Harju JK Laagri 2-1 Tartu JK Welco
- FK Grobiņa 6-1 FK Babrungas
A few Estonian friendlies are also covered in more depth in a separate article.