Outside the hall, snow is consolidating into ice and the pavements are increasingly treacherous. Inside a drum’s beat is echoing among the scattering of fans watching from an overhead gallery and RFS, the Latvian champions, are dominating their pre-season game against Nomme Kalju from Estonia. When their towering Albania defender, Herdi Prenga, puts them two up the outcome is effectively sealed and the only surprise is that a combative but less fluent away side introduce some doubt with a late consolation.
With winter rendering the adjacent grass pitch unplayable they are under a roof competing in the Livonian League, a new friendly tournament that pits teams from Latvia and Estonia together before domestic campaigns resume in March . But there is a growing movement in favour of making these fixtures a more formal, meaningful occurrence: as part of a pioneering, Uefa-approved cross-border “Baltic League” that would also include sides from Lithuania. Many in smaller countries sense existing structures are unequipped to deal with football’s perpetual widening of competitive and financial gulfs.
