The Žemaitijos Taurė () is an annual pre-season

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

tournament between teams from

Samogitia Samogitia, often known by its Lithuanian language, Lithuanian name ''Žemaitija'' (Samogitian language, Samogitian: ''Žemaitėjė''; see Samogitia#Etymology and alternative names, below for alternative and historical names) is one of the five ...

. It is organized by the

Telšiai County Telšiai County () is one of ten counties of Lithuania, counties in Lithuania. It is in the west of the country, and its Capital (political), capital is Telšiai. There are Lithuanians (98.7%), Latvians (0.1%), Russians (0.9%), and others (0.3%) ...

Football Federation and takes place in early March at the Telšiai Artificial Football Pitch in

Telšiai Telšiai (; Samogitian language, Samogitian: ''Telšē'') is a city in Lithuania with about 21,499 inhabitants. It is the capital of Telšiai County and Samogitia region, and it is located on the shores of Lake Mastis. Telšiai is one of the ol ...

, Lithuania.

History

The origins of the tournament seeks Samogitian Championship, which was started in the mid-1930s, with

Džiugas Džiugas is a Lithuanian masculine given name. It is derived from the Lithuanian adjective "džiugus" meaning "joyous, cheerful, happy". People bearing the name Džiugas include: *Džiugas Bartkus Džiugas Bartkus (born 7 November 1989) is a ...

winning the first three tournaments of 1935, 1936, 1937. The first modern Samogitia Cup was organised by Telšiai County Football Federation in 2015 to mark the 80 years from the birth of original tournament. It's hosted by Džiugas and held on 8–21 March as simple

round-robin tournament A round-robin tournament or all-play-all tournament is a competition format in which each contestant meets every other participant, usually in turn.''Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1971, G. & ...

Šilutė Šilutė (; previously ''Šilokarčiama''; ) is a city in the south of the Klaipėda County in western Lithuania. The city was part of the Klaipėda Region and ethnographic Lithuania Minor. Šilutė was the interwar period, interwar capital of Š ...

won the inaugural tournament after defeating Džiugas 2–1 in the last round. The format for later editions was changed a little bit as additional games for 1st, 3rd and 5th places were added after the group competitions. The amount of participating teams has also been expanded from 8 to 10 participants. Banga won the second edition of the cup. Hosts

finally became champions in 2017 tournament.

Pakruojis Pakruojis (; ) is a city in Lithuania. It is situated on the Kruoja River, which has a dam above the city. Forty three buildings of the manor, mentioned in 1531 still survive. History Pakruojis and it neighbourhood are within the boundaries of th ...

occurred as the fourth different winner in 2018 beating hosts Džiugas by a goal difference in the overall table as rules of the tournament were reverted to the first year format due to a decline in participating teams number. The competition was discontinued in 2019, though a U-17 tournament was organized instead.

Winners

Performance by team

Žemaitijos Taurė hosts

are the only team that have participated in all four tournaments. Together with

Palanga Palanga (; ; ) is a resort town, resort city in western Lithuania, on the shore of the Baltic Sea. Palanga is the busiest and the largest summer resort in Lithuania and has sand, sandy beaches (18 km, 11 miles long and up to 300 metres, 10 ...

and

Minija The Minija is a river in western Lithuania and a right tributary to the Nemunas. It is long.Lithuanian football friendly trophies Sport in Telšiai FC Džiugas Telšiai 2015 establishments in Lithuania Recurring sporting events established in 2015