1.How are things in football in beautiful Lithuania, after the end of covid?

«Finally we getting back to normal situation here. Football in all divisions is played with spectators. At first it took some time to bring them back to the stadiums, as people were cautious with public events, but now the situation is getting better and better.»

 Cherry on the cake was our Cup final last year in our brand new Darius and Girenas’ stadium in Kaunas, which was attended by more than 13 thousand people – number that we hadn’t seen for a long time.

 2. Now with the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, has this situation affected your country and your football to a greater extent?

«Many Ukrainians have come to our country since the start of war and we, as a federation, try to do our part in helping them integrate as best as we can.

 Along with the clubs we have agreed, that Ukrainian citizens can watch all of our top division games for free. Another way we are trying to help – clubs do not need to pay the fee for Ukrainian players, even though the fee is applied to players from other countries.

 Ukrainian children have easily integrated into our local football schools and academies, we are even holding special festivals for Ukrainian children to make them feel better here

 Since Russia started the war just before our Supercup game last year, we donated all the money for tickets to the organizations that are supporting Ukraine, we also held special auctions, where we sold shirts of some legendary football players and all the money also went to those organizations.

 Lithuania is one of the closest allies of Ukraine in this war and we are doing everything in our power to help this brotherly country of ours. Hopefully, in the near future we can have a friendly football game against Ukrainian national team, since the talks are already being held.»

3. Tell us in general about your national league and your national team, which we also watched in the recent friendly against Greece in Athens

«We can say, that our league is getting stronger each year. Finally we have a stable number of teams taking part in our top division (10) and our hard work together with our community finally paid of – our champion, Zalgiris Vilnius became the first Lithuanian team to make it to the group stage of a UEFA contest, when they took part in UEFA Europe Conference League group stage.

As for the national team, we are entering a new stage, where Edgaras Jankauskas, our legendary player (the only Lithuanian to this day, to have won the prestigious UEFA Champions league trophy) is starting his second stint in charge of the national team.

 We have some young, promising players to build our future around. The games against Serbia and Greece, which are well known for their football traditions and history, showed some positive moments and we are really looking forward to the future.»

4. At what level are the sports facilities in your country?

“Finally we can forget about the shame about not having a normal football stadium – above mentioned stadium in Kaunas was rated as top category by UEFA and we can finally invite top teams to Lithuania. Hopefully we will have our national stadium in capital Vilnius in few years’ time as well.

 Football clubs and academies are investing more and more into their own facilities and as a federation we trying to help them with all the necessary help.

 You probably heard that in the autumn of 2021 we held the biggest sports event in the history of Lithuania – FIFA futsal world cup, where 24 teams took part. We have some really modern arenas so we are hoping that in the future we can also bring some major futsal events to Lithuania, such as the UEFA futsal Euro or UEFA futsal Champions league final four event.

 So, in general, we could say that the situation with facilities is getting better each year as well and the whole community is working really hard to improve every day.»

 5. Is the football federation housed in a beautiful building? And how many employees does it employ?

 «Right now the federation is in capital Vilnius, along with our previously main stadium, but by the end of this year we are planning to move to Kaunas, where all the main sports facilities are – biggest stadium in the country, biggest arena in the country and recently renovated, one of the most modern sports’ hall.

 So we are hoping that if everything goes well, we will be moving the federation to Kaunas.

 As for the employees, right now federation is not too big – we have around 50 employees, not including the outsourcers that we hire for concrete events.»

Foreigners...

 6. How many foreigners can each team use in your national league?

«The number of foreigners that each team can register is unlimited, but teams must pay the fee for each foreigner they register (excluding Ukrainians, as we mentioned). So the more foreigners the team registers, the bigger fee they have to pay.

 During the game a minimum of 3 Lithuanian players must be playing for one team at all times.»

 7. What is the goal, personal and also of the football federation in which you lead

«We want to be improving each and every day, connect the whole football community and keep working towards best possible results. Results not only on the pitch, but off the pitch as well. We are facing different challenges every day but we know the direction where we want to go and want to stay on course.»

Politics and Football

 8. Do you think that politics should be involved in football?

«Politics can be described in many ways in this specific context, but if the politics are involved, the involvement should work both ways – the cooperations is always valuable but the politics should be willing to contribute to football and to negotiate on various topics. We want to have this connection between the government and our football federation and we have already made the first steps towards that.»

 9. Let's change the subject and go to the Champions League. Which teams do you think will claim the top trophy of the European Confederation this year?

 «I do not have one favourite in the competition, but nonetheless I think that the semi-final and the final should be great spectacle for the football fans all around the world.

 On one side we have the specialists of Champions League “Real Madrid” who are going up against the ambitious team of “Manchester City”, which is going for their first title.

 And on the other side we have the historic Milan derby between two legendary teams, who will be going head-two-head in this competition for the first time since 2005.

 What gives this matchup even more significance is the fact, that both semi-final games will be held in the legendary San Siro stadium just before its demolition, so it will really be two special evenings.»

 10. Finally, how much will the new format that will be effective from 24-25 help the teams and football in general?

«The season in which this new system will be implemented will mark a new era in the Champions League, since spectators will have even more great games to look forward to.

 It will generate even more revenue for the teams, which will help them to improve their squads and facilities. So personally I believe it will be an improvement, which, of course, will take some time to get used to, but I think it will have mostly positive impact.»