Vilnius Municipality on Possible Changes in 'Žalgiris': Our Hands Are Tied

2025-08-01 12:26

In the near future, the fans of Vilnius "Žalgiris" should not expect radical changes in the club.

Vladimir Čeburina's squad is struggling in the A league championship, not giving many chances for young Lithuanian players to shine, and the performance in Europe is something the Kazakh wants to forget as soon as possible. The Žalgiris team, having received very favorable opponents in both Champions League and Conference League qualifiers, fell face-first into the mud, failing to hit the target even once in two matches.

As Gabrielius Grubinskas, head of the city municipality's communication department, stated to the portal "EuroFootball.lt", angry "Žalgiris" fans should not pressure the mayor and other government representatives to enforce order in the team - all decision-making power is concentrated in the hands of the team director, Vilma Venslovaitė.

"Vilnius city municipality is not a sponsor of the football club 'Žalgiris' - funding is provided under the High-Performance Sports Project Funding Program, in which 'Žalgiris' participated and received funding.

The allocation of funding under the program is not related to the fact that the Vilnius city municipality is a shareholder of the team.

The Vilnius city municipality has two representatives on the club's board, while the delegation of a third member has been handed over to the fans.

However, we want to emphasize that according to the current organization’s statutes, the functions of the board are very limited, with the main functions carried out by the director.

Due to the extremely limited functions of the board, the municipality is not involved in the club's management, player, or coach selection issues,” Grubinskas stated.

Last October, it was announced that Vilnius would allocate as much as 4.3 million euros to the "Žalgiris" club from 2025 to 2027.

At that time, the city's mayor Valdas Benkunskas stated that "the allocated funds for professional sports clubs provide more opportunities to train young athletes, allowing them to grow their potential and increase motivation."

Nevertheless, "Žalgiris" director and coach Vladimir Čeburinas does not pay much attention to this. For example, there was a moment recorded in the return match of the Champions League qualifiers in Malta when there was not a single Lithuanian on the field among the guests.