World Cup football fever in Lithuania

  • 2010-06-30
  • By Rokas M. Tracevskis

FOOTBALLSPOTTING: The outdoor section of the Stars & Legends Sports Bar.

VILNIUS - The World Cup is not a life and death issue - it is much more than that. This simple truth is finally understood in Lithuania as well. World Cup fever has occupied Lithuania, which was considered to be a basketball-only country. According to the data by Sip Gallup Media/TNS, the average rating of the Lithuanian TV audience of a World Cup match is 4.5 percent (the data portrays the audience only for the first 11 World Cup matches), while the rating of a match of the entire last European basketball championship was four percent.

LTV and LNK channels, which bought rights to broadcast the World Cup in Lithuania, should be happy with the profit from advertising. The sales of big screen TV sets increased three times in Lithuania on the eve of the Cup. The Sip Gallup Media/TNS survey does not include TV viewers in pubs and restaurants. Their owners say that, unlike the situation some five or six years ago, the number of fans who are coming to watch football on the big screens there is now similar to the numbers of fans during the major basketball competitions.

Some of those pubs, like Universiteto PUB, attract predominantly foreign tourists and expats. Another place, loved by football-crazy fans, is the Stars & Legends Sports Bar, which was opened on June 11 in the Sarunas Hotel in Vilnius. Both the bar and hotel are owned by Sarunas Marciulionis, the former NBA basketball player. No wonder that NBA uniforms signed by Larry Bird, Magic Johnson and Karl Malone are situated there. A recently brought vuvuzella from South Africa is in that bar museum as well. The bar has an outdoor area where smoking is allowed. During the breaks and after matches, those who understand Lithuanian can follow discussions about the World Cup by Martynas Stankus, the Lithuanian public TV producer and journalist, with his guests whose variety is huge: from sport experts to Vilnius-based Lithuanian-speaking foreigners, or Miss Lithuania 1992, now living in Italy.

“Football became like work for many Lithuanians,” Starkus said. As all Lithuanian commentators, he is full of compassion for the players of North Korea, because nobody knows what will happen to them in that totalitarian country after their failure in the World Cup. The Portugal against North Korea match, where Portugal won 7-0, was the first ever (and probably the last) World Cup match which the North Korean leader allowed to show live on North Korean TV - the North Korean TV news never mentioned that match after it.

North Korea is No. 105 in the FIFA world ranking while Latvia is No. 46, Lithuania – No. 49 and Estonia – No. 99. For comparison, South Korea, which managed to get to the knock-out stage, is No. 47. It is much easier to get to the World Cup from other continents than from Europe. New Zealand, which took part in the World Cup, is No. 78. Liutauras Varanavicius, president of the Lithuanian Football Federation, states that Lithuania has plans to get into the next World Cup of the world’s most profitable sport.

Varanavicius paid 70 litas (20 euros) for a vuvuzella in South Africa during the World Cup. Ironically enough, a vuvuzella could be bought for 2.99 litas in the Maxima supermarket chain five years ago, but now there are no vuvuzellas there though Maxima and other supermarkets can still consider bringing vuvuzellas to Lithuania.
According to the data on the eve of the tournament by the Lithuanian company Ivega ir Ko, which sells World Cup-related souvenirs in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, the Estonians are mostly supporters of Holland, Brazil and Italy, the Latvians are fans of Brazil and Spain while the Lithuanians buy mostly souvenirs which are related to the national teams of Brazil, Holland, Italy, England, and Germany.

On June 24, the most popular Lithuanian Internet site delfi.lt asked its readers, “Which team will win the World Cup?” The results say a lot to football memorabilia sellers about the preferences of Lithuanians. Some 29 percent stated that Argentina will win the World Cup. Other answers are as follows: Brazil - 25 percent, Germany - nine percent, Holland - eight percent, Spain - six percent, England - five percent, Italy - one percent, “other team” - four percent. Some 14 percent of delfi.lt readers stated that they are not interested in the World Cup. On the same June 24, “blue mozzarellas,” as an angry Italian press nicknamed Italy’s team, which is the current world champion, were beaten by Slovakia and knocked out of the World Cup. For the first time the current World Cup holders and the world’s vice champions (France) left the World Cup at the group stage. Both occupied the last positions in their groups to the great joy of betting offices.

According to the Saitas travel agency, the interest in football started to grow in Lithuania some five years ago. Travel to matches of national football championships of England, Germany and Spain became popular - this year already more than 100 Lithuanian football fans made such trips. However, South Africa is a little bit too far for Lithuanians - only 10 fans bought their trips from Saitas to attend the World Cup. Such trip prices started from 12,000 litas. Now some fans buy trips to Germany and other countries participating in the World Cup to enjoy watching matches on big screens in an outdoor crowd there. The great season for incoming tourism for Lithuania will start next year, when it will host Europe’s basketball championship.