Mladá Boleslav is a very specific town. Owing to its proximity to Prague, it boasts three top-flight clubs across three of the country’s most popular sports, with the floorball side even going unbeaten on its way to this year’s league title. Thanks to its modest size and the presence of Škoda Auto, which employs roughly 30–40% of the local population, average monthly salaries are through the roof, while season tickets obtained via the company’s trade union cost a mere CZK 850 — perhaps explaining why most people turn up for three or four matches a year. With all that in mind, it only makes sense that a football club from such a very specific town would also be run quite, erm, specifically…

Last summer, we noted the weirdly lowkey, unenthusiastic club takeover by David Trunda, wondering if he wasn’t there just to “score populist points ahead of the Czech FA chairman election”. Turns out he absolutely was — and now Mladá Boleslav are stuck in an owner-less void, almost entirely at the mercy of Slavia, the very club that helped Trunda become Czech football’s boss. The good news? It can hardly get worse than the spring. And FKMB are now armed with a head coach who’s got serious potential to let the fans forget about what’s going on upstairs by implementing a ‘heavy-metal’ brand of football downstairs.