The club was founded in 1947 and represents the capital city of Lithuania, Vilnius. Žalgiris was the most famous Lithuanian team during the USSR years: it once became a bronze medalist of the USSR Championship (1987) and won the USSR First League Championship (1982). Žalgiris has also become Lithuania's champion 9 times, a national cup winner 13 times and a super cup winner 7 times and it is the most title-winning team of Lithuania.
The current season has been one of the best in the history of the Green Whites. Žalgiris became the first Lithuanian club to play in the European Championship group stage. The champion of Lithuania started playing from the Champions League where it won the first two rounds against the champions of Kosovo and Sweden, Ballkani and Malmö, but in the third qualifying round Žalgiris lost both legs to Norwegian champion Bodo Glimt. The team then continued in the Europa League play-off round where it lost to Bulgarian champion Ludogorets, but Žalgiris had already secured a place in the Conference League group stage.
Let us note that Pyunik and Žalgiris once have already faced each other in the European Championship. In the first leg of the second qualifying round of the 2013/14 Europa League our team led by Rafael Nazaryan lost 0:2 in Vilnius.
A week later Pyunik was winning the second leg thanks to a goal scored by Viulen Ayvazyan but at the end of the match the opponent was able to equalize the score and it ended in a tie, 1:1.
It is noteworthy that among the players who participated in that match 9 years ago only 35-year-old experienced midfielder Mantas Kuklys is currently included in Žalgiris. By the way, in 2013 in the second leg of the teams in Yerevan he was the one who equalized the score with a penalty shot at the end of the match.
