Finland 2-1 Poland: An indefensible horror-comedy brought to you by Michał Probierz

Image via @LaczyNasPilka on Twitter

A recipe for disaster had already been written for Poland coming into tonight’s loss to Finland in Helsinki, and the master chef responsible for cooking up such a performance was none other than Michał Probierz.

Probierz, and he alone, is responsible for the team he is in charge of losing a match that until halfway through Sunday night, even the Finnish would have said was heavily weighted in Poland’s favour.

Thanks to Probierz, the morale of Polish fans and indeed the whole image of the national team was trashed, their greatest ever player in Robert Lewandowski thoroughly humiliated, and all there was to show for it was a Selekcjoner pleased with himself for making such a bold move and a catastrophic result which dropped Poland from first in their qualifying group to third in the space of two hours, partly in thanks to Holland’s dismantling of Malta.

However really the congratulations are in order for Probierz, who contributed to such a vile atmosphere that for most of the match the visiting Polish fans were telling him to fuck off. I’m not in a mood to disagree and that’s sad, because Probierz had been able to restore some respect to the national team during the first half of what will surely only be a year and a half in charge of Poland.

As for the actual nature of the match itself, it felt like the end of something for sure. An uncharacteristic Łukasz Skorupski error with the ball at his feet led to a soft penalty in a game which it has to be said featured many soft fouls. Skorupski was not able to stop the penalty he was culpable for giving away, with Joel Pohjanpalo sending him the wrong way.

After the break it was much the same, and with Poland pushing to equalise they were caught on the counter, with none other than Cracovia’s own Benjamin Kallman scoring the second for Finland.

Poland did pull one back, a scrappy goal bundled home by Jakub Kiwior. In truth the Biało-Czerwoni popped the ball around quite nicely, took a lot of shots, but didn’t really ever look taking any of their chances. In short, it was a pretty typical Probierz-ball display.

The match was suspended with just under twenty minutes to play as there was a medical emergency in the crowd. Thankfully the person involved was treated at the stadium and transported to hospital. A word in this incident for tonight’s Poland captain Jan Bednarek, who spotted the incident occurring and ran to the medical staff on the sideline and implored a halt to the game.

Once the match was underway again Poland rallied, but to no avail in the end. I would be truly shocked if Probierz remained in his post by the time the next qualifiers come around given the circus he managed to create. It really was a case of the saying “making a mountain out of a mole hill”, and this is squarely on Probierz’s shoulders.

The only players who really turned up tonight for Poland were Nicola Zalewski, who was by far their best, as well as Matty Cash. The defence of Mateusz Skrzypczak, Kiwior and Bednarek did little wrong but still conceded two goals. More irritating were the performances of Karol Świderski and Sebastian Szymański. 

I really think after tonight I’ve realised I’m losing patience with Szymański in the national team. He’s a good player, he has scored some great goals and played some good games for Poland, but he is unbelievably inconsistent with that quality. Perhaps there is a reason that there have been times in recent years where he has been left out of the side.

Also I have not seen this level of anger towards a Selekcjoner for some time, and there have been some acrimonious times in recent years, from Czesław Michniewicz’s decision to start arguments with everyone from journalists to fans to his own players, Fernando Santos’ apathy towards the whole thing and the manner in which Paulo Sousa departed. Nothing however seems to compare to Probierz throwing a grenade into what had been an otherwise relatively settled squad.

Even if the players were at best indifferent towards this change of captain, responsibility falls on Probierz to know what this decision would result in and on Cezary Kulesza as PZPN president for washing his hands of the matter. For me, Probierz has no choice but to resign. However, he has already said he won’t, another bad decision from him.

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