Varbergs BOIS: Preseason 2026

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the story! Last time I left you, we had a luck-lusted attempt at champions league knockout progression which ended up with a draw against Arsenal while internationally, Uruguay had sailed into the World cup group stages against, amongst others, England.

This one will just be about Varberg however, and our transfer spree since January along with the champions league and domestic league campaigns. So lets dive in, transfers first!

I have to admit, it has been a rather busy one with a number of transfers coming in, and out! Obviously, my main priorities were signing youngsters for the future so I could qualify them for the ‘Home Grown’ rule, however I also divulged in some free talent that I thought would get me a bit of profit while helping the team out here and there. So here is the transfer round-up this winter:

We will start with the ‘Outs’.
Only a couple of players that left us from the first team. Milan Djuric was the first to leave after his contract wasn’t renewed. Strangely I picked him up last summer and he hasn’t played as much as I thought he might have. This, coupled with a huge wage bill and degrading physical stats meant he was on his way.
Coupling him would be Luka Mijaljevic. Again, another striker brought with Djuric in the summer and he was purely used for his ‘Home Grown’ status. Bench-warming came at a cool £14,000 p/w and for this, he was out the door for good.
The other players your seeing are mearly reserve/youth players that were nowhere near good enough for the club. They were sent their marching orders without a second thought.

Also, what you cant see from that list are the lads who retired. Sandro left us in Decemeber, picked up the midfielder on a free back in 2021 and was brilliant for the first two years before getting replaced due to his physical stats getting the better of him. The other player was Filip Stenström, a great full back that I obtained in 2022. You may remember him best for his fantastic goal (which is my current goal of the month entry!).

So.. Ins!
Matthias Urun

First one then, and I was looking closer to home for this signing. Urun has joined us from league runners up Hammarby for £350k. Not a bad price for a ‘Home Grown’ 17 year old that has a decent potential. Probably isnt going to get a game, but when I have trained him up with the facilities we have at the club now, ill send him out on loan.

Mario Tejera

Every time I look at this lad, he looks better and better. The left back position was a troubling one for me, I have Scherer on the right and I needed a decent left back to pair and I managed to stumble upon Mario. £2.4m was his price tag from Villarreal and I couldn’t be happier. Unfortunately, he wont grow into a ‘Home Grown’ player, but at 18, he has massive potential.

Dudu

Its freebie time! Dudu will be brought in purely for profit as I can see me at least selling him on for a few million at the end of the season. Will most likely be a rotation player in the center of midfield, but he has very good stats, coupled with great experience. Hopefully, he can produce when he is brought on!

Iñaki Huarte

Tell you what, Sears will be envious of this signing! With Basque nationality, I nabbed him up for an astounding £180k! Couldn’t believe it, but Athletic had transfer listed him when he was worth £1.8m and I literally couldn’t resist as he has the potential to play at a similar level to Lecomte. At the tender age of 16, he still has miles of potential to fill and will become a great rotational striker in a few years i’m sure.

Adriano

Last but not least, it is another free signing. Adriano has joined us after a massive spell at Dinamo Moscow which saw him obtain Russian citizenship with 13 caps to boot! Wanted a new face amongst that back line and i thought that with his experience, we would become a lot more solid as Kemal isn’t performing as he should.

In July, I will be introducing the following to you as well; Denis Belyakov, Louis Taylor with Paulo and Facundo Castro coming at the end of 2026. The squad is going to be huge!

So this is the squad as it stands now, showing all the potential that the players have to offer!

Lastly for this page will be the news!
Only one piece of information again really and its to do with the youth facilities:

Yeah thats right, the upgrade is getting further upgraded! Yay :). Thats great news for us, because at the moment our youth facilities are at ‘Excellent’. Not too sure what the next level up is, but we will hopefully find out next year. ‘State of the art’?

Go to the next page to see how we started the season..

Again, like the last pre-season update i’m not going to bore you with the friendly results. I did however this time make sure that I did a whole bunch of them to make sure they were fit enough after their winter long break in preparation for the matches against Arsenal. Granted, it wont make my lads any better ability wise, but hopefully with a few games down them they would get into the swing of things and give them a run for their money.

First up then, the Home match against Arsenal. Hopefully we can get a decent result to kick start our season off:

Not bad at all. Yes, they managed to fork out an away goal which will mean we have to score at the Emirates but we will take this! The ever present Adam Lecomte scoring the leveler 5 minutes from normal time to give us a chance of progressing. We are a lesser side to them at the end of the day, but my BOIS but in a right good shift and hopefully this can continue in the away leg.

Before that though, we had a Super Cup to win! This time, it was against Hammarby who came runners up in the league last year. Not only that, but they qualified for the group stages of the champions league!? No mugs then, and I was fully aware of this.

Get in! Another trophy to add to the cabinet. Things really didn’t get off to the best of starts with Hammarby scoring inside the first 15 minutes but we fought back and ultimately got our reward after some fine play down the right saw Svensson smash home from a tight angle. Coupled with a Lecomte goal, we finished the half with an advantage, seeing out the rest of the game with a goal to boot. Furuholm the man on song this time. The big Fin, has legendary status at the club now which is brilliant. Has been a great servant for us over the years :).

The all important match at the Emirates next then..

Oh dear. Well, we had a full squad of players but they really couldn’t put up with the force of Arsenal. Shame really, as I would have liked to see us progress, but it shows the gulf of class between our two sides and we still have a long way to go before we can challenge for such honours. Up for the task though don’t get me wrong! Will continue to improve, and i’m even more determined to win it now!

Lastly then, ill just show you the results of the league until the end of March:

With those we have shot to the top of the league! Great wins though, and again it was mostly down to the talismatic man that is Adam Lecomte. He’s managed to wrack up 7 goals in the first 3 which is brilliant for us. Hopefully we don’t rely on him to much though as i’m very fearful of an injury. Furuholm has done the job before though and that is why he is ultimately still at the club!

Alright, thats it for this episode boys and girls. The next one will be once qualifying has finished for the Champions League. Couple that with a transfer window and a World Cup and it will be a big one i’m sure! Will be on my new computer (with any luck) too :D

Thanks for reading, and as ever.. Hej då :D