Predictably, Poland’s U-21s were better entertainment than the senior side. Pros and cons of what we’ve seen over the past 48 hours

Images via @LaczyNasPilka on Twitter

Seeing as I was unable to watch Poland’s friendly with New Zealand live, it would’ve been a bit hollow to write a match report in the manner I normally do after international matches on this website.

Instead, having watched back the New Zealand game, I thought it would be interesting to compare it to how the U-21s got on against Montenegro’s U-21 side in their qualifier.

I wasn’t the only one opining in the build-up to these two games that there was every chance we’d be more impressed and entertained by Poland’s U-21s than the senior team, several pundits and journalists had also come to this conclusion.

Firstly however, we should deal with the ins and outs of how the senior side got on Thursday night at a very much not sold out Stadion Śląski against New Zealand. 

One thing to state right at the start is that it was not a thrilling match by any stretch of the imagination. Another uninspiring friendly performance by Poland, but again because it was such a heavily rotated side in a game that really didn’t mean anything, you do have to take a look at it with a sense of perspective.

That being said it was still a deeply disappointing display from several notable members of the starting eleven. Przemysław Frankowski and Krzysztof Piątek came in for particular and eminently justifiable criticism. To see Paweł Wszołek come on and immediately perform a level above Frankowski was a real statement, and as for Piątek there was no doubt he was shown up by Karol Świderski when he was brought on. 

Luckily for Poland the relative form of their strikers outside of Robert Lewandowski, in this case Świderski and Piątek but also others of recent times, tends to dovetail nicely so that when one is out of form the other is in form or at least capable of performing better than the other. For me, there is little difference on paper between Piątek and Świderski but it was clear to see how much better form the latter is in. 

You can say the same, and many are, about Frankowski and Wszołek. No doubt Frankowski plays his club football a level above Wszołek, but they are very similar players and one is in a better moment than the other, so starkly portrayed on Thursday night.

Jakub Piotrowski also did nothing to suggest he should be getting more time on the pitch for Poland, although it should be said the position he was asked to play was not his favoured role. Nevertheless you would have expected him to cope much better than he did, and this is an accusation you could level at several.

Sebastian Szymański was unfortunately yet again a huge misnomer in a Poland shirt. It’s borderline inexplicable how at times he seems such a good player and then so ineffective at others, and irritatingly it always seems like his best games happen at club level. This being said he does still pop up with goals and assists for the national team, but the number of underwhelming performances from Szymański do appear to outweigh the positive ones.

Then you come to arguably the most divisive display, that of Kacper Kozłowski. During the game, a lot of comments were positive, but following there were many saying he was poor. For me, and I know I’m a big fan of his, but Kozłowski was hardly the worst player on the pitch. Especially in the context of him playing his first senior Poland match since 2021, I thought he was fine. I think a lot of people were expecting some kind of revelation, a second coming if you will, but Kozłowski simply turned in a fairly average performance. Sometimes he looked good on the ball, at other times poor, whether it was enough to earn more minutes at the international level who’s to say.

In terms of the real, obvious positives, I would place Jan Ziółkowski top (like everyone else is). By far and away the best player on the pitch, he looks like a real fixture for the years to come. Early days of course but the signs are there that he can and hopefully will continue on his current trajectory. 

Michał Skóraś was also really quite good, and I would fully expect him to start in the absence of Nicola Zalewski on Sunday against Lithuania. With the exception of goalscorer Piotr Zieliński, he was the biggest threat to New Zealand’s goal for most of the match.

Selekcjoner Jan Urban seemed pretty irked in the post-match press conference, openly suggesting that it seems pretty easy to get a Poland call-up these days because the pool of available players is small, something fans and journalists have suggested for a while now. Personally I don’t think it’s quite that bad, but Thursday’s friendly has led to a lot more questioning than many of us expected during this international break.

In my opinion there are far too many conclusions being drawn from what is essentially a meaningless game of football, but in some ways this was inevitable. This is not to excuse the below par performances, but in many ways this was foreseeable, as we all knew there would be wholesale changes by Urban and it’d be fair to say that this is a combination of players that is unlikely to play together too many times again in the future.

However, if you contrast Thursday night with the U-21s victory on Friday, then there is little argument which one featured a more inspiring attack. Again in some ways this was likely to be the case given the headline inclusions of Oskar Pietuszewski, Kacper Urbański and Jan Faberski. A word as well for Tomasz Pieńko, captaining the side and putting in a really strong performance. 

Again this needs to be tempered with a sense of perspective, we all know there is a level of freedom greater in age group football, especially for players well-versed already in senior football such as the aforementioned names. That being said if you asked a casual viewer of the two matches, all four of those players could easily have featured for the senior team the night before (maybe even to greater effect than those that did). 

To be frank, we have said for a long time that Poland’s squad is in need of a serious refresh, and this past 48 hours may add fuel to that fire. I’m here to provide the opposite viewpoint, in that yes I would happily see Pietuszewski and Urbański in Poland’s senior side, but throwing out seven, eight, or nine regular squad members is not a wise thing for Urban to do with a World Cup around the corner. A World Cup which Poland still need to secure their place in, lest we forget.

Make no mistake, I enjoyed watching the U-21s far more than I did the senior team these past two days, but that was predictable. Coming into this international break we knew the Lithuania match would be the big test, and in that regard nothing has changed. All we have seen is that perhaps some of Poland’s rotational options aren’t quite at the level we expected, and that some of the U-21s are playing to a higher standard that those on the fringes of the senior squad. 

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