Without good management, money goes to waste? What mistakes are Neptūnas and Tauras making?
Photo: FK Taurage/Facebook Two clubs based in the Žemaitija region have been unable to reach the Toplyga for several years now. Poor football knowledge, overestimating their own abilities, or simply a lack of desire to reach the top division – there are many possible explanations, but the final result tells the whole story. Year after year, their efforts amount to nothing.
While basketball has dominated Klaipėda for many years, Tauragė only welcomed its first club competing in the Lithuanian Basketball League (LKL) this year. Tauragė has two excellent football stadiums – an artificial pitch and the main stadium – but the mentality and lack of knowledge do not work in football’s favour. What are the reasons behind this? They vary, but calling the clubs’ directors only to hear their sighs and excuses is of no interest to anyone. Quite simply, it is not worth wasting time on, especially considering football’s popularity in Lithuania and the public’s limited interest in such explanations.
The Situation at Neptūnas
After both Atlantas and Palanga were expelled from the A Lyga following the 2019 season due to the organisation and execution of large-scale match-fixing activities, no other club from a city on the Baltic Sea coast emerged to replace them.
Many might argue that basketball rules in Klaipėda, leaving only scraps for football – and they would be partly right. However, what is the point of the municipality allocating even more money when the existing funding has produced nothing particularly impressive, apart from last year’s promotion/relegation play-off matches? Municipally funded clubs operating with significantly smaller budgets manage to achieve similar or even identical results.
Photo: FK AtmosferaWhile last year Neptūnas finished in second place, this season they are ranked among the mid-table teams and are not serious contenders for the top four.
Management mistakes, a lack of quality graduates from their own football academy, or simply favouritism towards people close to the municipality?
Whatever the case, according to my sources, the budget of the coastal club this year is close to €500,000 (€240,000 allocated to the senior team and €260,000 to Kęstutis Ivaškevičius’ academy, which forms part of the club’s structure).
In Lithuania, there is an established practice: if you were a reasonably good footballer, a comfortable position at a club or within the federation is practically guaranteed. In such an ecosystem, it is impossible for new football managers to emerge because they are simply not allowed into these closed structures.
Abroad, things work somewhat differently. Football organisations employ numerous people across different departments, and unlike in Lithuania, investment is directed towards developing new talent and scouting. Investing merely for the sake of investing, by increasing players’ salaries and consequently distorting the market, is not genuine investment. This is reflected in international competitions.
It is simply an imitation of work, distributing municipal funds among people within one’s own circle. The real work takes place on training pitches with children. It goes largely unnoticed and receives little attention, but without it, nothing can be achieved.
The question is what level of specialists work with these children, what conditions they have, and what opportunities exist for them to progress from youth football into the senior team. Do these children see realistic opportunities to achieve something, or do they abandon the sport halfway through their development, before reaching their athletic peak?
Another important question is whether the coaches are honest and genuinely motivated to work.
Returning to Neptūnas, in mid-November last year, Oleh Lutkov and his favoured Ukrainian players (all three of whom usually started matches) failed to defeat a severely weakened Riteriai side, despite having extremely favourable circumstances considering what was happening at the capital club.
In the return leg, the individual quality of Arvydas Novikovas alone was enough to outplay Neptūnas and tear apart every area of their team. However, at the beginning of this season, in late April, the club parted ways with the Ukrainian specialist.
Looking at this year’s squad, Lithuanian players form its core. This was supposed to be the winning formula for the season. However, Simonas Urbys, Darius Zubauskas and Aurimas Skurdelis (13 goals between the three of them) are not the names capable of making a fundamental difference in the Pirma Lyga.
They may be decent players, but when you add forwards who failed to establish themselves in the Toplyga, such as Juozas Lubas and Nojus Lukšys, alongside the central defensive partnership of Aironas Trakšelis and Olaide Badmus (a goal difference of two), the result is what we see today.
A collection of players who failed to establish themselves elsewhere, with none of the team’s departments fully balanced.
But most importantly – what matters most? The supporters. And they are not in the stadium. Local Klaipėda residents are more inclined to attend home matches of the Klaipėda FM football school than those of Neptūnas.
Overall, the squad is not particularly young, with an average age of 25.1 years. Head coach Andrius Jokšas, who joined the club after Easter, has not established himself at all in senior men’s football. His recent coaching record demonstrates this, with seven defeats in his last ten matches.
None of this makes for a successful combination. The coastal club’s reserve team competes in the Second League’s A Division, where it occupies 12th place among 15 participating clubs, with a goal difference of minus 19.
What does club director Kęstutis Ivaškevičius, whose academy operates within the port city’s club structure, think about the last two seasons? He probably believes that a few cosmetic changes next winter will be enough and that the locomotive will continue moving as before – as long as the budget does not run out.
After speaking with a locally elected representative of Klaipėda municipality, one thing became clear.
“At the moment, the city is not particularly interested in throwing more money at football. If local businesspeople want to invest and raise the standard of football in the city, they are welcome to do so. We will not stand in their way. If they want, they can try to renovate the city’s central stadium and attempt to secure EU funding.”
“If the business community, which generates substantial revenue from port activities, and a city that contributes a significant share of Lithuania’s GDP do not see such a need. As the saying goes, where there is demand, there will be supply.”
“As much as we might like football, basketball is currently more attractive to both sponsors and politicians in Klaipėda,” commented a municipal council member who wished to remain anonymous.
The conclusion is simple: until people who genuinely love football and are willing to invest in it emerge in the city, the municipality will contribute only what has already been allocated.
The Situation at Tauragė’s Tauras
A great deal could be written about Tauras, and at considerable length. There are many stories surrounding this club and its environment.
The last time the club played in the Lithuanian top-flight was in 2013. The club is essentially controlled by a major local businessman involved in the timber and construction industries (Taurų Kedras). The same businessman also administers the academy and the municipal funding allocated to the club.
How does Robertas Jurkšaitis manage to combine these responsibilities? He seems perfectly comfortable. Salaries at the club are good and paid on time, while there are few people around him who question his understanding or knowledge of football. In fact, there are none.
Under a decision by Tauragė municipality, the club and FA Tauras academy have been allocated a solid half a million euros annually until 2027. The main team’s backup players will no longer play in the Second League championships from 2026. So what kind of youth are they raising?
So what kind of young players are they developing? Speaking about the football itself, last year the club set itself the objective of reaching the Toplyga. Their former coach, Darius Gvildys, failed to achieve that goal.
Towards the end of last season, the club squandered its entire advantage and, instead of securing a guaranteed promotion/relegation play-off against Riteriai, ended up with nothing.
The different areas of the team were not functioning together. Defenders and central midfielders practically stopped controlling the middle of the pitch, there were numerous lost individual duels, a lack of fighting spirit and poor finishing.
The heavily promoted foreign striker S. Nyuiadzi fooled everyone: he arrived without having fully recovered from a cruciate ligament injury, could not run for extended periods and experienced constant knee pain. As a result, the season’s objectives were not achieved, and the coach was shown the door.
During the winter, former Dainava coach, Belarusian Sergej Kuznetsov, arrived with the expectation that he would introduce changes to the training process and finally bring the so-called football sunshine to Tauragė.
What came of it? From the very beginning, it was a poor decision by R. Jurkšaitis. S. Kuznetsov, who exclusively promotes defensive football and builds his teams entirely around defending, was unable to adapt and develop a style of play in which his team would take the initiative. Consequently, he was replaced.
His replacement, Darius Stažys, arrived midway through the season without serious experience or achievements, but he also failed to change the situation. On top of that, he is also a board member of the Tauragė County Football Federation. What could he possibly change?
The second major mistake made by the Tauras director was giving the Belarusian coach complete freedom to assemble the squad during the winter. What could be better? As the saying goes, one hand washes the other.
Former Lithuania national team head coach Igoris Pankratjevas made the right decision at the time by refusing to coach such a Tauras side, despite being offered the position.
In their last ten matches, Tauras managed just two victories – against lower-half teams Jonava and Garliava, both by narrow margins of 3–2 and 1–0. Combined with the many points dropped, this resulted in eighth place, which, frankly speaking, is shameful.
With that kind of money and such an excellent stadium, being so far out of contention raises the question: should someone be held accountable for the poor results of the city’s representative team? But in Lithuania, football officials who maintain good relationships with town mayors belong to an untouchable caste.
Did the team have the tools to achieve better results? The club brought in midfielders Justas Petravičius and Dominykas Kubilinskas from Šiauliai. However, as time showed, one failed to establish himself, while the other did not produce anything extraordinary either. Although he is an attacking midfielder, apart from six assists in 25 matches this year, his goals column remains empty.
As expected, Sergej Kuznetsov’s arrival in the winter was accompanied by an army of players from his own circle: five Ukrainians and two very young defenders – Naglis Paliušis from Dainava and Belarusian Marat Krasikov.
From the very beginning, the coach assembled a defensive-minded squad because he does not know how to play any other way. Ukrainian players are very convenient – there is no registration fee to pay for them. However, this is one of the biggest absurdities introduced by Lithuania’s own football governing body, the Lithuanian Football Federation (LFF). It deprives local players of opportunities to develop through the Pirma Lyga, and many eventually become frustrated and quit football.
The second major absurdity that the LFF continues to cling to is the number of foreign players in Lithuanian football. Until the number of Lithuanian players on the pitch is properly balanced across the country’s leading leagues, we will continue importing unwanted, low-quality foreign players.
This is a business of its own, with numerous interested parties benefiting from it – from agents and club directors to the players themselves, all of whom earn money directly from the arrangement. There is certainly nothing wrong with bringing in foreign players, but only under one condition: integrating them and eventually selling them.
In Estonia, for example, a separate club employee is responsible for this process As a result, over the past two years, Estonia has sold more players abroad than either of the other two Baltic countries.
However, our clubs continue operating according to the principle of “I’ll do something for you, and you’ll do something for me”, while football itself is not even part of the conversation.
Conclusion: The chain continues to operate without interruption. It is enough to look at player transfers within the Lithuanian domestic market over the past two seasons: those who are not good enough for the Toplyga are considered perfectly suitable for the Pirma Lyga. What kind of scouting and football management can we even talk about?
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