I saw an entertaining soccer game today: one in which Poland, co-hosts of the Euro 2012 tournament, tied Russia 1-1 coming from behind. What this means is that the Polish team is one win away (in a game against Czech Republic this Saturday) from advancing to the quarterfinals of the European Championship for the very first time.
Despite the fact that Poland looked slightly the better team and could just as well have won, the tie feels good because before the game everyone was writing us off as easy pray, as Russia is theoretically a much stronger team than Poland. What also feels good to me is that the goalscorer for Poland was a player that I'm personally a big fan of--the team captain Jakub (Kuba) Błaszczykowski. Błaszczykowski, 27, is currently a right-winger for the Bundesliga champions Borussia Dortmund. I've been following his career ever since he was a wee lad of 18, playing for a small club in Poland, telling everyone who would listen that one day Kuba was going to be great. Ha! Told you so.
One thing that many fans do not know about this player is that he lives his life in the shadows of an unspeakable tragedy. When he was 10, his father stabbed his mother to death right in front of him. Since then he has been raised by his uncle and his grandmother. Traumatized by the event, little Kuba refused to leave his bed for a week, and didn't utter a single word for months. Already showing sings of tremendous soccer talent, he has lost the will not just to play but to live at all. Somehow, though, he has been able to reclaim that will. So congratulations, Kuba, for today's goal, I knew that one day you were going to do something like this.
Here is a compilation of clips showing Kuba's skills throughout his career:
That's a sick shot. So precise it is scary.
ReplyDeleteAll of the soccer talking heads seem to agree it's been the prettiest goal of the tournament thus far.
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