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After experiencing international shame due to poor conditions for football matches and trainings, today the leaders of the Lithuanian Football Federation sent official letters to the Lithuanian government. This is announced on the official LFF website.
The general director of the Lithuanian Football Federation, Julius Kvedaras, sent official letters to His Excellency President Valdas Adamkus, Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas, and Speaker of the Seimas Artūras Paulauskas. Here are excerpts from them:
To H.E. President Valdas Adamkus:
"I am addressing you, dear President, as a football coach, player, specialist, football lover, and general director of the Lithuanian Football Federation.
In your election campaign, you promised the whole of Lithuania that once you become President, we will go to Europe. After fixing sports bases, children will be engaged in additional sports education, football will revive in Lithuania, with stadiums full of spectators chanting 'Lietuva'.
Your promises on television, just like television itself, have a big influence on children and teenagers. So every time I hear the question: 'when will we form a team with the President of the Republic of Lithuania Valdas Adamkus, as promised in TV commercials, when will we go to Europe with a football team?'
Not finding answers to serious questions coming from children's lips, I kindly address you - as a person, as the leader of the Lithuanian state, as a figure with mature experience in governing Lithuania, asking for your help. Fourteen years have passed since the Restoration of Independence of Lithuania. Commercial buildings are rising in the places of football fields and stadiums.
Football stadiums, which were built over 50 years ago, are abandoned, crumbling, unable to accommodate spectators, Lithuanian football fans. Footballers do not have conditions to train. Moreover, Lithuania's prospective youth trains on sand fields, and the leaders of the Lithuanian Sports Department publicly claim that there are already too many football fields in Lithuania.
To Speaker of the Seimas Artūras Paulauskas:
Lithuanian football is currently at a stalemate. There are not only fields for footballers to train, but also stadiums in Lithuania suitable for hosting international football matches, which could be watched by full stands of spectators. We lag behind the World and Europe by at least a century. When the football delegation from Spain arrived, they could not understand why representatives of the Lithuanian government completely ignore sports facilities, which are necessary not only for football but also for other sports. The world and Europe are laughing at us.
We ask for your initiative, cooperation, your direct work and assistance, as the Lithuanian Football Federation alone, without your help, cannot solve the accumulated problems not only in football, but also in Lithuanian sports, throughout all the years of Lithuanian Independence," the letter reads.
To Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas:
The world and Europe are laughing at us. Understandably, for a reason: we are lagging behind them by at least a century. The Vilnius "Žalgiris" stadium has been standing for over 50 years. It may be trendy to demolish, ruin, and build commercial buildings in Lithuania. But let's pause for a moment - where will we go?
We, the leaders of the Lithuanian Football Federation, could have offered to hold the World Cup qualifying match Lithuania - Spain only at the Vilnius "Žalgiris" stadium. This stadium is expensive for us, as there are no more stadiums in Vilnius, although it is completely unsuitable for international level football matches.
