‘Ineffective striker’: Lewandowski’s struggles on the road to glory | Nick Ames
14-Jun-2021 07:00:21 | Guardian
Poland captain is the world’s finest centre-forward but former teammates and opponents recall very different times
Daniel Kokosinski remembers walking off the pitch in a huff. In the summer of 2006 he was a defender for Znicz Pruszkow, building a career in Poland’s uncompromising third tier, but he knew a bit about finding the net. In a league often decided on set pieces, Kokosinski had recently finished as his team’s top scorer; now, in a friendly against Dolcan Zabki, he watched a new teammate miss an embarrassing number of chances and felt aghast.
“I was really angry,” he says. “I came to the coach and asked: ‘Who the hell is he? What an ineffective striker!’”
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