Marked for Saulius Novikovas
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Jul 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zalgiris will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market12 Jul 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market12 Jul 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zalgiris can pretend not to have heard.
Market12 Jul 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Zalgiris is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Transfer targets12 Jul 2027
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Ludogorets is saying, and nobody at Zalgiris is enjoying the guessing.
Boardroom12 Jul 2027
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Giedrius Matulevičius has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Transfer targets12 Jul 2027
The offer went to Kauno Zalgiris this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Transfer targets12 Jul 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Gonzalo Ávila has outgrown this division
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Zalgiris know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Jul 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zalgiris will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market5 Jul 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zalgiris can pretend not to have heard.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: AFC Wimbledon keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad5 Jul 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Zalgiris know it.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
The dugout5 Jul 2027
The manager makes an example of Ivan Lytvynenko
“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.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
Zalgiris have made the call to Ludogorets. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Boardroom5 Jul 2027
Intake day at the Zalgiris academy
5 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
Squad5 Jul 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Martynas Šetkus
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Martynas Šetkus has come out of that comparison in the side, and Zalgiris have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 Jun 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zalgiris will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market28 Jun 2027
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Giedrius Matulevičius had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The dugout28 Jun 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Zalgiris may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market28 Jun 2027
Zalgiris say no — this time
The offer from Kauno Zalgiris for Nikola Petković was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Market28 Jun 2027
Add another name to the list: Stumbras have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Ovidijus Verbickas. The answer from Zalgiris has not changed — yet.
Market28 Jun 2027
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Transfer targets28 Jun 2027
Zalgiris asked and Siauliai said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Transfer targets28 Jun 2027
Ludogorets have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Transfer targets28 Jun 2027
AFC Wimbledon have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad21 Jun 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Zalgiris will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Transfer targets21 Jun 2027
Zalgiris asked and Chelyabinsk said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Transfer targets21 Jun 2027
Zalgiris have gone to Suduva with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Squad21 Jun 2027
Mai Kolbl is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Transfer targets21 Jun 2027
$56.0K was the most the club would pay and Kauno Zalgiris were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Market21 Jun 2027
The name of Giedrius Matulevičius has come up in conversations Zalgiris were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad21 Jun 2027
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Zalgiris know which stage they are at.
The dugout21 Jun 2027
Ivan Lytvynenko has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Zalgiris 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.
Squad21 Jun 2027
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Zalgiris will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad14 Jun 2027
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Zalgiris will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match14 Jun 2027
The season ends: position 4 for Zalgiris
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 26 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
Market14 Jun 2027
Zalgiris say no — this time
The offer from Stumbras for Ovidijus Verbickas was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Market14 Jun 2027
Zalgiris spend $1.1M to raise the standard
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $1.1M has been paid because Deividas Eliosius is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Boardroom14 Jun 2027
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $60.0K — a club that wants Valdas Paulauskas enough to be asked twice.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
The offer went to Siauliai this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Market14 Jun 2027
The fee is $240.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Atlantas drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
The offer went to Kauno Zalgiris this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
Zalgiris offered $46.0K; Suduva said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad7 Jun 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 55 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market7 Jun 2027
Suduva come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Zalgiris did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Transfer targets7 Jun 2027
The offer went to Atlantas this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Squad7 Jun 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Zalgiris know it.
Match5 Jun 2027
Suduva left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings7 Jun 2027
Successful dribbles: 17. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
The manager makes an example of Ivan Lytvynenko
“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.
Market7 Jun 2027
He is 20, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 0‑1, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: another club keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Paulius Golubickas and Zalgiris agree another 4 years.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Saulius Novikovas 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Arvydas Paulauskas 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Modestas Kuklys 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Edgaras Lasickas 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Zalgiris know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Zalgiris will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
A loan enquiry to Spezia: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.