Marked for Paulius Eliosius
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad3 May 2027
Paulius Eliosius damages knee ligaments — 17 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 17 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Match3 May 2027
Every point is an argument now for Siauliai
Position 7 and 5 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Player ratings3 May 2027
Successful dribbles: 32. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings3 May 2027
Lukas Barauskas scored one and made one — 7.91
Two of the goals had his name somewhere on them, which is the afternoon a manager wants from anybody asked to both create and finish. 7.91, and 2 involvements.
Squad3 May 2027
Néstor Canelón 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.
Match1 May 2027
Beaten 3‑4, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Match1 May 2027
Ignas Paulauskas among the goals in a wild afternoon
7 goals in one match, Ignas Paulauskas on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Siauliai and Utenis.
Squad3 May 2027
Linas Jankauskas 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.
Player ratings3 May 2027
Ignas Paulauskas was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.05. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad26 Apr 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Paulius Eliosius
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siauliai lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings26 Apr 2027
Néstor Canelón, 36, rolls back the years — 8.17
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.17 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad26 Apr 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siauliai this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Siauliai training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Linas Jankauskas 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.
Match24 Apr 2027
Atlantas made Siauliai work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad26 Apr 2027
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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match17 Apr 2027
Beaten 2‑5 by Trakai, and beaten everywhere it matters. The inquest starts on the training pitch on Monday morning.
Squad19 Apr 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Paulius Eliosius
33 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siauliai lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match17 Apr 2027
No end in sight to Siauliai's wait for a win
9 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Siauliai has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
A brace, and Lukas Barauskas takes the afternoon — 8.10
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Lukas Barauskas provided it, and the 8.10 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Match17 Apr 2027
Siauliai leaking at the back
7 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
Age has not caught Néstor Canelón yet — 7.96
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.96 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Squad19 Apr 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Siauliai this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match17 Apr 2027
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 7 goals between Siauliai and Trakai, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad19 Apr 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings12 Apr 2027
Successful dribbles: 45. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad12 Apr 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Paulius Eliosius
40 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Siauliai lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match10 Apr 2027
The wait goes on for Siauliai
8 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Market12 Apr 2027
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Siauliai, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match10 Apr 2027
Siauliai leaking at the back
6 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Néstor Canelón 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.