The clubs have shaken hands with Zalgiris; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Saulius Dubickas and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Lazar Sajčić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The training ground goes quiet for a fortnight. 4 men have gone off to be somebody else’s players, and the manager is left with the ones nobody has called.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Vykintas Mikoliunas trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Something was said to Rashad Pelage and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Saulius Dubickas was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad20 May 2030
Lazar Sajčić falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Kauno Zalgiris next, and one man in the Trakai dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
1 on the scoresheet on his first appearance and a mark of 7.33 beside it. Most debuts are got through; this one was enjoyed, by him and by everybody watching it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Trakai can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trakai this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Apr 2030
Words at Trakai training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lazar Sajčić is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Linas Klimavicius has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Linas Dubickas has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Modestas Cernych is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Trakai interviewed the field and appointed the corridor: Andrius Satkus keeps the job he had been doing in all but title. Sometimes the safest pair of hands is the one already holding the wheel.
Player ratings1 Apr 2030
A brace, and Marius Dapkus takes the afternoon — 8.86
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marius Dapkus provided it, and the 8.86 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Position 3, 7 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trakai this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Apr 2030
Words at Trakai training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lazar Sajčić is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Successful dribbles: 18. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout1 Apr 2030
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Andrius Satkus kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Saulius Dubickas was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Marked 8.09 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
13 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Vykintas Mikoliunas’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Trakai needing him to play as if none of it matters.
5 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Trakai lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Trakai will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Trakai is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Something was said to Deividas Lasickas and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
24 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Trakai lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Vikintas Jankauskas has, at Trakai, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad7 Jan 2030
Words at Trakai training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lazar Sajčić is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nobody at Trakai will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Something was said to Deividas Lasickas and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
In brief
BoardroomOpen for business: Trakai enter the window
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Utenis will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
20 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Utenis lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Utenis can pretend not to have heard.
Žygimantas Baltrūnas and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Words at Utenis training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kajus Bička is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Arnas Valskis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Utenis will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Utenis has been clear about where Vikintas Cernych stands, which is more than many ever get.
5 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Utenis could ask drops and the wages Kajus Bička can ask rise.