Sabah manager Valdas Dambrauskas has an unusual curriculum vitae.
Manchester United’s first opponents after securing a return to the Champions League are one of four teams playing in the competition for the first time, and Dambrauskas will go head-to-head with United boss Michael Carrick at Old Trafford on Thursday.
Sabah are first-time champions of Azerbaijan and the route Dambrauskas took to get them there was circuitous to say the least. The Lithuanian, 49, even counts Man United themselves among his former employers.
‘To come from Lithuania and be given that opportunity was a huge step for me’
Dambrauskas and his girlfriend, later his wife, moved to England after he won the equivalent of £725 on a Lithuanian television game show based on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?
He enrolled on a sports science and coaching course at London Metropolitan University and soon found he needed to top up the funds if his coaching education was to continue. He secured an interview for a job with Man United’s soccer schools programme.
Pick the ultimate 4-4-2 line-up from players in FourFourTwo’s definitive Top 100 List
“After we’d paid for our flights and accommodation, we had money left to cover our expenses for just one month, so I needed to get a part-time job urgently,” Dambrauskas told FourFourTwo.
“At the time I still couldn’t speak English properly, but they liked me because of my personality and I got the job. To come from Lithuania and be given that opportunity was a huge step for me.”
Dambrauskas went on to work with Brentford’s Centre of Excellence and as the manager of Kingsbury London Tigers, now London Tigers, who were then competing in the Spartan South Midlands League.
“That was a fantastic experience – all of my jobs were part of a great learning process, up to 2014 when I got my first chance as a head coach back in Lithuania,” he said.
It was the doomed Ekranas who gave him that opportunity. They went bust the next year, only reforming in 2020. Dambrauskas has since managed in Latvia, Bulgaria, Greece, Cyprus, Hungary and Croatia. He’s a league champion in three countries.
True to form, Dambrauskas’ Sabah needed to take the long way round in the Champions League.
Starting in July, with the World Cup still rumbling on, the Azeri champions beat Welsh side The New Saints in the first qualifying round before seeing off KuPS and AGF to set up a play-off against Israel’s Hapoel Be’er Sheva. They scored three goals in extra time at the end of the second leg.
After their Champions League trip to Old Trafford, Sabah will face league phase fixtures against Slavia Prague, Borussia Dortmund, Viking, Barcelona, Villarreal, Napoli and Arsenal.