Sabah Baku coach: I worked odd jobs everywhere to become a coach; I once worked at Manchester United's football school

On September 11 Beijing time, Manchester United will face Sabah Baku in Matchday 1 of the Champions League league phase. In an interview with The Athletic, Sabah Baku head coach Valdas Dambrauskas recalled his development journey.

The interview content follows.

The conversation with Valdas Dambrauskas began with an apology. The 49-year-old coach had just guided Azerbaijan's Sabah Baku into the Champions League league phase.

On Thursday, he will lead the team out of the tunnel at Old Trafford to face Manchester United. However, this historic achievement was not the first topic of discussion, but instead a television appearance 24 years ago.

In 2002, he appeared on Sesi nuliai — milijonas (Six Zeros — One Million), a Lithuanian quiz show based on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?

“In the past two weeks, I have been asked about this a million times,” Dambrauskas said with a laugh while recalling his television experience. After Sabah Baku qualified, footage of the program went viral on social media.

“It is like a Hollywood movie trying to compress one person's life story into it.”

That television appearance became a key moment in his career.

At the time, the 25-year-old's playing career had not even gone beyond Lithuania's non-professional third tier.

He said: “Since I was young, my dream was always to become a football coach, but UEFA coaching licenses did not exist then. If you were not a famous player, becoming a coach was almost impossible.”

Dambrauskas made a plan. He would go to London, take coaching courses, improve his English and begin a long-term professional path.

However, he needed money. His television appearance earned him 4,000 litas, Lithuania's former currency replaced by the euro in 2015, equal to 725 pounds or 1,300 dollars. The prize money was equivalent to six months' wages for an average Lithuanian at the time and funded his move to London that summer.

“It was really difficult,” Dambrauskas recalled about his early years in England. His girlfriend Ingrida, now his wife, went with him. “When we arrived here, we had no contacts, no help, no wealth, and our English was poor. It was a huge challenge.” They settled in north London, where they lived for nearly 10 years and where their two children were born.

“We had to accept all kinds of odd jobs that came our way. At any stage, we might have four or five jobs at the same time. Besides that, I was studying full-time at university, volunteering at local football clubs and helping raise our family.”

At different stages, Dambrauskas worked as a laborer, in retail, at a kindergarten, cleaned floors at a local bar, delivered newspapers, worked as a childminder and did sports development work, often holding several of these jobs simultaneously.

These earnings helped him pay for his university degree and coaching courses, while commuting between jobs became time for studying.

Eventually, he earned a first-class honours degree in sports science and coaching from London Metropolitan University.

“It was a huge challenge, but everything was actually within our expectations. We were grateful for the life we had then and the opportunities it created. Moving to England was the best decision we could have made.”

His first breakthrough came in 2004, when he received an opportunity at Manchester United's football school, and later worked at Fulham and Brentford in London.

His first head coaching role was with Kingsbury London Tigers, a semi-professional club that he led in FA Cup qualifying matches.

It was a community-focused club known for the diversity of its players.

“The 11 players that team fielded often came from 11 different countries. It was eye-opening for me; I learned about many different cultures, languages and backgrounds.”

When Sabah Baku defeated Israel's Hapoel Be'er Sheva to qualify for the Champions League, Dambrauskas' starting XI also came from 11 different countries.

Dambrauskas and his family returned to Lithuania at the end of 2010.

He was appointed assistant first-team coach and reserve-team manager at domestic champions Ekranas, while also coaching Lithuania's U17 national team before later taking charge of the U19 side.

By 2014, he was regarded as a rising star among local coaches and was appointed head coach of Žalgiris, Lithuania's biggest and most successful club.

In three years, he led the team to eight trophies, including two league titles.

By 2026, Dambrauskas had won 13 trophies in five countries, including league titles in Lithuania, Bulgaria and Azerbaijan, domestic cups in Latvia and Croatia, and had also coached clubs in Greece, Cyprus and Hungary.

He once set the iconic Champions League anthem as his phone ringtone, but before this he had never truly managed a club in the main stage of Europe's elite club competition.

His first contact with Azerbaijan's Sabah Baku came in 2023.

“They surprised me: they knew exactly what they wanted, they were ambitious, they spoke to me about building a new training base and scouting system, and their potential was obvious.”

However, Dambrauskas eventually chose a job with Cypriot club Omonia Nicosia, but he maintained contact with Sabah Baku sporting director Lamine Hasanov.

“It started as a professional contact and developed into a very strong relationship. We texted each other almost every day and talked about football.”

Last summer, Dambrauskas accepted Sabah Baku's renewed invitation.

That season brought unprecedented success: Sabah Baku won the league title for the first time, completed a domestic double and went unbeaten for 33 consecutive matches.

During that process, they ended Qarabag's dominance in domestic football.

Qarabag had won 11 league titles in the previous 12 seasons and reached the Champions League play-off stage.

Qarabag's success was historically significant for Azerbaijani football, but the demands of European competition meant they eventually finished the league nine points behind Sabah Baku.

Sabah Baku are based in Masazir, 15 kilometers northwest of Azerbaijan's capital Baku.

They are the first team to reach the Champions League knockout stage while also using pink as one of their main club colors.

The club's nickname is the “Pink-Black Army,” derived from the unique pink waters of nearby Lake Masazir. The club was founded in 2017, three years after Azerbaijan's Ministry of Education established the Sabah Group project, which aimed to improve higher education quality and apply innovative teaching methods.

Azerbaijan Deputy Minister of Education Firudin Gurbanov is also a Sabah Baku board member, while the board is chaired by real estate tycoon Yagub Huseynov.

Under Dambrauskas, they became Azerbaijani champions, and their Champions League run included victories over Welsh side The New Saints, Finnish club KuPS, Danish club Aarhus and Hapoel Be'er Sheva.

Due to their lack of European experience, Sabah Baku were unseeded in every round. The victory over Hapoel Be'er Sheva was especially dramatic. Before the end of the second leg, Truls Mütalimov scored in the fourth minute of stoppage time to level the tie, and Sabah Baku won in extra time.

“For someone who did not come from the football world, coaching a Champions League team is a huge achievement,” Dambrauskas said. “But for me, every milestone is special, and every achievement brings huge responsibility. I am looking forward to this experience, but I still have more dreams to chase.”

For Dambrauskas, managing against Manchester United — where he gained early coaching experience — represents a full circle in his career.

It also brought renewed questions about that television appearance, which was the starting point of his life story.

“It was a very complicated show with many questions,” he recalled with a helpless smile. “The question I did not know was who was the first person to win the Academy Award for Best Actor and receive the first Oscar in 1929. If I ever get that question again, his name will be forever etched in my mind… Emil Jannings!”