From Kevin Connolly :
Hi Myles,
I’ve been very interested in all the recent ANR talk about Kaziu Deyna.
I saw Poland’s 1974 World Cup wins over Argentina and Italy, when Deyna was at his peak.
What a player – a midfield general who broke forward to score important goals too. That was Poland best-ever team. If their best-ever forward Wlodek Lubanski had been fit, who knows far they’d have gone?
I’ll never forget the final group game in Stuttgart – absolute chaos getting there on the tram – 74,000 packed into the old Neckar Stadion, nearly all supporting Italy.
Andrzej Szarmach headed the Poles in front. Then a couple of minutes before half time, Henryk Kasperczak played a ball low to the edge of the box. Deyna sprinted in front of his marker and smashed a 20-yarder past Dino Zoff. Probably the most memorable goal he ever scored.
You can see it here…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KecXxciB7jI
Capello (yep, him!) scored for Italy with four minutes left.
But Poland held on 2-1 and eliminated the Italians.
Myles says:
An amazing strike by Deyna, which I had forgotten.
Of the players I’ve seen, only George Best could have scored that goal from there.
I remember Szarmach as a lion, a powerhouse athlete, one of those big-hearted centre forwards.