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Ukraine-Poland 1:0. The Only Way Is…Down?

August 21st, 2008 | By: tomasz | 17 Comments »

Poland lost to Ukraine 0:1 after a very poor display. We tried new, 5-2-3 tactics today, but without much positive effect. No new players proved better that the old ones and the old ones repeated their Euro performance. Fortunately, it was only a friendly where players’ main aim was not to get hurt.

Ukraine-Poland 0:1 (Krawczenko 45′)
Poland: Lukasz Fabianski – Pawel Golanski (13. Marcin Kowalczyk), Adam Kokoszka (46. Piotr Polczak), Dariusz Dudka, Michal Zewlakow, Jacek Krzynowek- Mariusz Lewandowski, Rafal Murawski (46. Roger Guereiro)-Jakub Blaszczykowski (56. Radoslaw Majewski), Euzebiusz Smolarek (46. Tomasz Zahorski), Ireneusz Jelen (75. Szymon Pawłowski).

What can be written about a match like that? That it took place? It was the worst sort of friendly that you can imagine. Boring game, no organized play, no determination, no emotions. Poles didn’t use the chance to redeem their Euro sins. The only conclusion is that the new formation, 5-2-3, isn’t a cure to our problems. We left too much space on the flanks as it took too much time for both full backs to return to defense. As a result our defensive play was chaotic and unstable. Moreover, this tactics requires central defenders to distribute the ball well; ours couldn’t cope with that. Midfield was unable to keep the ball and Jelen didn’t get any opening passes. We had no true wingers in this game as Ebi and Kuba played closer to the centre and full backs couldn’t time their forward runs well. Generally, none of the players did well enough to be considered the leader of the team. None of the new players added extra quality to the team. One can only hope that with more determination and different formation we can play better. But we’ll remain in the dark about that till the first qualifier against Slovenia.

Player ratings (1-10):
Lukasz Fabianski 6: quite a confident performance. He dealt well with crosses and long shots. We’ve got a solid backup keeper.
Pawel Golanski: didn’t play long enough. Another injury, when was the last time he stayed healthy for more than 6 months?
Adam Kokoszka 3: nowhere near being Bak’s replacement. Lack of positioning, lack of agility. Lost the ball far too many times, poor distribution.
Dariusz Dudka 4: I hoped that he’ll be the defender that would pass the ball forward. It didn’t happen. I prefer to see him in midfield.
Michal Zewlakow 5: the most reliable Polish defender. Tried to bring together our defensive line. Seems to be a good choice for a captain.
Jacek Krzynowek 5: tried a lot of offensive runs, knew when to join the attack, but without much effect. Doesn’t look very dynamic. Still, he was one of the most active Poles.
Mariusz Lewandowski 4: couldn’t organize our play. A typical performance with some long shots, lost possession and hard tackles.
Rafal Murawski 4: can’t transfer on the international scene what he shows for Lech. Mostly anonymous performance.
Jakub Blaszczykowski 4: I’m disappointed. I hoped he’ll be our new leader, but it was only a moderate game from Kuba. Tackled hard at the beginning of the game, didn’t risk injury afterwards.
Ebi Smolarek 3: completely out of form. Hard times for Ebi.
Ireneusz Jelen 4: tried to find his place on the field but didn’t get any good balls from the midfield. Surprisingly, he wasn’t faster than Ukrainian defenders.
Marcin Kowalczyk 4: didn’t show anything that would put him in the pecking order before Wasilewski. Deserves another chance though.
Piotr Polczak 4: definetely better than Kokoszka, but lost far too many headers for such a tall guy. Not the fastest of defenders.
Roger Guerreiro 4: no miracle, he’s just out of form from the beginning of the season. Useful in possession play, but unable to show any of his magic.
Radoslaw Majewski 6: for me he’s the only player that showed any kind of balls. Asked for possession, tried diagonal passes, shots, long passes to wings. Improved our play.
Tomasz Zahorski 4: another unspectacular performance by Zahor. Needs a good game for nt fast.
Szymon Pawlowski 5: didn’t have much time to show his skills, but at least he provided a dangerous header in the dying minutes of the game.

A match to forget, only a proof that friendlies don’t make sense. We’ll see the true face of our team against Slovenia. Will it be a Portugal-like performance or a Croatia-like? For now, the latter is more possible.

The sole goal of the game (trust me, there were no highlights on our side):

Tags: Beenhakker, Blaszczykowski, Dudka, Fabianski, Golanski, Group A, Jelen, Kokoszka, Kowalczyk, Krzynowek, Lewandowski, Majewski, Murawski, Pawlowski, Poland, Polczak, Roger, Smolarek, Zahorski, Zewlakow

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Comments

By Nick | August 21st, 2008 at 9:50 am

Tomasz, I don’t mean to sound ridiculous, but did you even watch the game? I agree with about half of your assesment. Poland was trying out a new system, something completely unorthodox for this team. The players said after the game that they had no idea how to move around in the new formation, and the way the 2nd half turned out (it was slightly more fluid than the first) you can clearly believe them.

I also think your player ratings are a little off. Kokoszka should get no higher than -8, as every time he got the ball he looked like he had no idea what to do with it. Lewandowski in my opinion played very well. He didnt attempt many shots, and the 2 that he did try were on target and got us corners – a much improved-on perfromance from the Euros. He was able to move around and distribute the ball pretty well if you ask me. Krzynowek, after a lousy first half of the match showed that he still has something left in the tank. Not much, as he is pretty slow, but there’s still something there. A great energizer off the bench maybe? (Although I wish he would play regularly at Wolfsburg – maybe that would solve his problems.) Jelen – he was plenty fast. At one point when a defender passed back he caught up to the ball and almost scored as he and the goalkeeper hit the ball at the same time. Zewlakow – 5?! He did great, a 7 at least. As far as I could see he made only one real mistake during the game. He’ll be a good captain for us after the calamity of Zurawski. Finally, as a former goalkeeper, I hope Fabianski learns not to show off (he tried a trick move to get past a defender that almost cost us another goal) and that with a shot like that you either have to parry away the ball strongly, away from the opposing player (Boruc) or you simply have to have quick-quick reflexes and catch that thing (Kuszczak), because let’s face it, although that header was close range, it wasn’t all that strong. Not that it was his fault (Kowalczyk left Krawchenko completely unmarked) but just something the youngster will have to improve on.

I wish these guys the best – I KNOW that we can play a better, higher quality brand of football than this, but hey, a friendly’s a friendly

By tomasz | August 21st, 2008 at 11:48 am

@Nick
I agree with most of what you wrote, but the ratings couldn’t have been higher because the game, generally, was very poor and we lost. As for individual players: Kokoszka was the worst player on the pitch, no doubt. As for Lewandowski, I expect more of him. He was better than Murawski or Roger, but we didn’t exactly control the game and that’s what you expect from midfielders. Krzynowek: I wrote that he was one of the most active Poles, at least he tried. At the same time, apart from winning a free kick his play didn’t result in any clear chances. He admitted after the game that he didn’t have enough strength for 90 minutes. Jelen: he ran a lot, but I don’t remember him posing any huge threat. No dribbles, no individual actions; he also didn’t get any passes. Zewlakow: he was our best defender, no doubt; he’s currently the leader of our defence. Still, we lost the game so note 7 would be much too high. As for Fabianski, it was an instinctive save from a couple of metres so I wouldn’t necessarily critisize him for that. I like the way he plays outside the 5 metre line.

I’m also sure that we can play better, but noone can guarantee that we will.

Posted from Poland

By Alek | August 21st, 2008 at 11:49 am

Fabianski should have parried the ball away to his right for a corner if he couldn’t hold onto it. I blame Kokoszka and a little of Dudka’s fault because they just watched Krawczenko run up and get some power on his header. Then they decided to watch him do it again, they were just ball watching the entire time and never even tried to go for the ball, I don’t know where Kowalczyk was when the goal was scored so I don’t know if he is to blame. One good thing is that it looks like we got rid of our retarded off-side trap, thank God! Either way we should have used the friendly to try some of our Euro 2012 team into the squad, it wont ever hurt to replace our old farts with some young blood, they played well against Tel Aviv or whoever it was (some Israeli team).

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 2:56 pm

17 year old left-back Thimotee Kolodzieczak has joined Olympique Lyonnais on loan, with a buy option. In an interview with the official website he mentions that there were talks with Manchester United but OL was more determined to sign him. He represents France U17s but judging by his surname he probably has some Polish ancestry. I think if he had gone to an English club there might have been a chance to get him to play for us, at OL there will be huge pressure to represent France.

Posted from Canada

By tomasz | August 21st, 2008 at 3:07 pm

If he proves very good then he’ll certainly choose France. If not then we’ve got a chance to capture him. But we’ll learn it in 4 years time.

Posted from Poland

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 3:30 pm

I wouldn’t say that’s a certainty at all. Stulin is reportedly a huge talent, he didn’t choose Germany did he though?

Another thing to keep in mind is, foreign clubs (especially English) are very interested in the large and increasingly wealthy Polish market. So if he had gone to England I think he might have considered representing Poland because clubs like MU would very much like to get a foothold in that market.

Posted from Canada

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 4:07 pm

A couple more details: It’s only a loan at the moment because of some law protecting minors that they’re trying to get around.

Claude Puel: “He has all the qualities to play at a high level. He has speed, endurance, and a good ‘relance’. A player for the future but who might make an appearance in a professional league even this season.”

Source: ouest-france.fr

Posted from Canada

By Alek | August 21st, 2008 at 4:19 pm

Where are you getting all this info? I cant find a thing about him

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 4:32 pm

news.google.com > type “Kolodzieczak” > click “sort by date” > then click “results in all languages”

You’ll get articles from various news sources around the world. The article I was reading is from ouest-france.fr

I’m practically fluent in French by the way.

Posted from Canada

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 4:34 pm

If you don’t know the language just paste the URL in translate.google.com

Posted from Canada

By MarcinO | August 21st, 2008 at 5:01 pm

Those who are eligible to play for Poland will always choose the country with the better development program. Their development and major exposure are probably the main reasons. They also look at how good the team is and the chances for team success. A country like Italy develops more talent than most and therefore is a more attractive choice. Italy has produced a lot of world class players. A perfect example was Robert Acquafresca. He choose to play for Italy for those reasons.

This will continue to happen until we establish a system in Poland where players would see the benefits for them by going through our program. In the end, its all about money. it’s a case of “what can your football program do for me.” People want to compare themselves and strive to become the next so and so. I’m pretty sure there is no one who want to be the next Jacek Krzynowek.

By zaraza | August 21st, 2008 at 5:17 pm

That’s true for many players but not all. Why did Klasnic turn down Germany, do Croatia have a better development program and more chances for team glory?

In fact lots of ethnic Balkan and Turkish players have turned down more successful countries to play for their parents’ country. It’s rare for ethnic Polish players though, but not unheard of. Apparently Germany would love to have Stulin but so far he hasn’t been swayed. Martin Zakrzewski on the other hand is said to be considering switching…

Posted from Canada

By skillz | August 21st, 2008 at 5:51 pm

these highlights suck, there’s better highlights on the internet. You probably wont like them if you’re a Polish fan though. From the highlights that I saw, it looked pretty exciting to me. Unfortunately for Shevchenko I think Ukraine’s future is in their youth and domestic league players, although Voronin looks really good as always, hope he leaves liverpool and goes to Germany.

By Alek | August 21st, 2008 at 6:43 pm

If any of those bastards switch I swear to God I’ll kill em. I cant stand loosing any more good poles. Boenisch I can get over easy because he was never even closely Polish, same with Aquafresca he wasn’t ever really Polish. Klose is just a bitch so I dont care, Podolski though, retarded Janas didn’t ever call him up and now look. Does anyone remember the Polish twins who play for Arminia Bielefeld’s youth team. Ones a wing back and the other a striker but I always forget their names.

By tomasz | August 22nd, 2008 at 4:12 am

Since Kolodziejczak now plays for French youth team he’ll most certainly choose French senior team in the future provided he sees any chances of a call up. Our only chance is to capture those players as early as possible (Stulin, Zakrzewski or Przybylko twins from Arminia) or wait till they realise that they’re not good enough to play for their first choice nation (as was the case with Tyrala). And I don’t blame any player for choosing other nation, it’s their own decision.
@skillz
I couldn’t find better highlights when I was writing the note. Believe me, the game was nothing spectacular.

Posted from Poland

By zaraza | August 22nd, 2008 at 12:25 pm

We should not be waiting for players who’s first choice is some other country. Doesn’t really much for the idea that playing for Poland is an honor..

Posted from Canada

By zaraza | August 22nd, 2008 at 12:26 pm

*Doesn’t really do much

Posted from Canada

Comments are closed