Marked for Modestas Cernych
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad16 Nov 2026
Andrius Vaitkunas 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
A row about effort at Stumbras
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Aleksandar Pavlović was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad7 Sep 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Karolis Sernas
45 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Stumbras lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market7 Sep 2026
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Market7 Sep 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Stumbras can pretend not to have heard.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Window shuts: 3 in, 3 out at Stumbras
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 3 arrived, 3 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Stumbras have done the hard part with Kauno Zalgiris, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad7 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Stumbras this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Justas Eliosius 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.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gornik Leczna have kept their man, and Stumbras go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad7 Sep 2026
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Vikintas Satkus has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Aug 2026
Karolis Sernas damages knee ligaments — 59 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 59 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.
Market24 Aug 2026
Atlantas come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Stumbras did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market24 Aug 2026
“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 Stumbras, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Dimitrije Novićević has, at Stumbras, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Stumbras
Aleksandar Pavlović 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.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Suduva have kept their man, and Stumbras go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad24 Aug 2026
A row about effort at Stumbras
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitrije Novićević was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Market24 Aug 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Stumbras, another week without a signature from Dimitrije Novićević.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.