Klaudiusz Hirsch, the Polish Coach, on all things EMF Euro.
Coach, EMF EURO in Hungary did not go as we desired. Especially – the match against Czech Republic. Was the Czech team so strong? Or we should blame it on our miserable performance?
It was not our best day and we did a lot, to make the challenge easier for the Czech Republic. Virtually all of the goals for Czech Republic were unintended gifts given to them by our defence and goalkeeper – Czechs gained their 4 goal advantage in a pretty easy way. After these four blows it was difficult to gather ourselves and fight them back.
So what exactly caused this loss?
I think we lost this game in our heads. In the match against Russia we proved, that we can not only stand our side against a higher ranked rival, but we can even dominate the course of the game. I must say, that the Russians impressed me with their skills and way of playing even more than the Czechs. Nevertheless, the Czech Republic showed that they are a very good team, they know how to use their goalkeeper as a kind of a playmaker. They earned their win against us, and they certainly deserved their bronze medal.
Lets come back to the match against Russia. Don’t you regret, that our players lacked some cold blood and could not defeat Russian team? If they did, we would avoid Czech Republic in the knockout stage and the chances for quarterfinal might rise significantly.
I would say this way: we might have as well played in a much more difficult group and not reach the knockout stage at all. A good example for this is “the group of death” with Romania, Lithuania, France and Spain in it. We had the comfort to play against Russia very relaxed, assuring our place in 1/8 before the match. We were a better team, but we failed to take our chances and had to face Czech Republic as a consequence. But, if we dream about winning a EMF Euro medal, and we believe that we are capable of winning it, we have to be ready to play against the best teams. Because only beating the best teams might deliver us a much desired medal.
What is the future of Polish National Minifootball team then? Have the players proved themselves in EMF Euro 2016? What must be done, to grab an EMF Euro medal eventually?
I do not want to judge my players harshly. Those, who played in Hungary have a great potential. The problem is, that – as always – we lack international matches before the tournaments and therefore players do not understand each other perfectly on the pitch. I think that this lack of experience and mutual understanding is the main reason for our EMF Euro 2016 failure, and I do not want to blame the players for it. If we can improve the course of our EMF Euro 2017 preparations and spend more time together, I am sure that some kind of automatism will appear in our play, and – most significantly – self-confidence, which will ooze irrespective of the current score during the match. I am positive that it will help us significantly to achieve better results,
Just after our encounter with Czech Republic, England beat the five time champions, Romania. Then, Kazakhstan became the EMF Euro 2016 champion. Were you surprised by those results?
Before EMF Euro 2016 started, I was hoping that we will play against Romania in the knock-out stage, and we will be the cause of a major surprise. Instead, it was the English team, that beat Romania and they deserve standing ovation for that. After our 1/8 match I was expecting that Czech Republic will win the whole tournament, but it was the brilliant Kazakhstan that grabbed the gold medal. Congratulations for Kazakhstan and lets hope, that we will be the next “dark horse” of EMF Euro.