“I think this story about the TV quiz is a little overrated,” Valdas Dambrauskas told Euronews after he became the first Baltic coach to reach the Champions League main round, leading a club that did not exist nine years ago to fixtures against Arsenal, Manchester United and Barcelona.
In 2002, Dambrauskas won the prize money on the Lithuanian television show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” and used it to move to England to fund his UEFA coaching badges.
He had no professional football background.
To pay for the courses, he worked as a babysitter, salesman and newspaper delivery man. He eventually got into the youth academies at Fulham, Brentford and Manchester United. Sabah FC in Baku is his 10th club.
“Sometimes it was difficult. I had to work hard, and sometimes to believe when myself and those around me were doubting,” Dambrauskas recalled.
“I take this achievement as a milestone and believe that journey is more important. There are other dreams ahead and I really don’t want to stop.”
Sabah beat Hapoel Beer Sheva 5-2 last Tuesday — 6-4 on aggregate — to reach the Champions League main round, guaranteeing eight matches against European football’s biggest clubs. Barcelona, Borussia Dortmund, Napoli and Slavia Prague will come to Baku.
Dambrauskas and his squad travel to Arsenal and Manchester United in England, then to Villarreal in Spain and Viking in Norway.
Dambrauskas was equally clear-eyed about what comes next.
“Everyone is speaking about the Champions League, but the Azerbaijan championship is what allows you to play there. It is very important we keep the focus and prepare for every game that we are going to play,” he said.
“We have a fantastic international environment where a lot of times we select eleven different nationalities in the starting line-up. In this kind of environment the main word we base our philosophy on is respect.”
‘It is time to focus’
Sabah Futbol Klubu were founded in Baku in 2017. They won the Azerbaijan Cup in the 2024-25 season and the Azerbaijan Premier League title the following year, ending Qarabağ FK’s domestic dominance.
Facing the likes of Barcelona and Arsenal came quickly in a rare footballing dream come true, and for Sabah right-back and right-winger Tellur Mutallimov, the scale of what lies ahead is a matter of focus, not thrills.
“Playing against clubs of this stature gives me a greater sense of responsibility and extra motivation rather than excitement,” Mutallimov told Euronews.
“The celebrations are now behind us. It is time to focus all our attention on the important and difficult matches ahead.”
Mutallimov paid tribute to supporters who had followed the club through the qualifying rounds.
“Even when we played far away from home in Denmark, England, Finland and Romania, we were not alone. We are grateful to our compatriots living abroad, who came to the stadiums and supported us during those matches.”
Dambrauskas is assisted by Valerio Zuddas, a 37-year-old Italian who has worked across 10 countries and is responsible for the team’s defensive organisation and analysis of European opponents.
“The biggest satisfaction for Valdas as head coach and for us as coaching staff is that we can clearly see how the players are into our team principles and how they believe in them,” Zuddas told Euronews.
“Sometimes they find solutions by themselves inside our structure, their level of understanding of the game allows us to propose always different strategies and variations that help us to be more and more competitive,” he said.
Dreaming differently about football
Club president Magsud Adigozalov said the route to the Champions League was built on analytics rather than spending.
“We could not compete financially with many established European clubs, so we had to find our own competitive advantages,” Adigozalov told Euronews.
“We were inspired by the Moneyball philosophy, which demonstrated that intelligent use of data and recruitment can help a club compete far beyond what its financial size might suggest,” he explained.
Yet to Adigozalov, the human factor always comes first.
“Footballers are people before they are assets or statistics. We try to provide players with excellent training and living conditions and treat them and their families with respect,” Adigozalov said.
Sabah FC’s total squad market value is estimated to be around €16.65 million, a far cry from Barcelona’s €1.1 billion or Manchester United’s €900 million.
Napoli centre-back Benoît Badiashile, who just transferred from Chelsea, is valued at roughly the same as the entire Azerbaijani squad.
Adigozalov remains undeterred and a firm believer in hard work above all.
“The Champions League is the result everyone can see today. What makes us especially proud is the system, the culture and the work behind it that people did not see for nine years.”
Qualifying for the main round brings Sabah a base fee of millions of euros in direct UEFA distributions, alongside broadcasting rights income and new sponsorship opportunities.
Adigozalov said the longer-term impact will be on understanding that nothing is out of reach in sports like football.
“A young boy or girl sitting in the stadium and watching Barcelona or Borussia Dortmund play against Sabah may start dreaming differently about football,” he said.
“If this achievement brings more children into football, more families into stadiums and creates greater belief in Azerbaijani football, then its impact will be much bigger than Sabah itself.”