Dariusz KurowskireportsLeszno is a small, quiet town in Poland
with a population of around 4,
people, 30 kilometres from the capital
city of Warsaw. Until recently, it had
relatively few claims to fame; now it
is known as the place where Robert
Lewandowski lived and grew up.
“In 2016 we gave him Honourable
Citizenship, the first such title in our
history, because we are very proud of
him,” declared former Leszno mayor
Andrzej Cieslak.
Playing in the streets of Leszno,
Lewandowski fell in love with football.
When he was just eight, his father,
Krzysztof, took him to Varsovia,
a youth club in Warsaw.
“I remember him as the smallest,
skinniest boy,” recalls Lewandowski’s first
coach, Marek Siwecki, who passed away
last year. “His legs looked like two thin
sticks. But I let him show me what he
could do with a ball, and I said: ‘Okay,
you will join my team, even though I
have a group of players that are two
years older.’”
To say that it was a humble start for
the future Champions League winner
would be an understatement: Varsovia’s
training base was a disaster.
“Only one field for all the teams – so
uneven that it was called “potato field”
- two barracks with dressing rooms, and
no showers,” says Siwecki. “Only a gutter
and a tap with cold water for the boys to
wash their dirty legs a bit after training.”
With such conditions, it is worth
asking: why did Krzysztof decide to
bring his son to such a club?
“Because nobody else wanted him!”
explains Siwecki. “I know that he visited
the big Warsaw clubs like Legia and
Polonia, but for them he was too
small. I could not understand why
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they did not even test him on the field.
Fortunately, I did.”
Nicknamed “Bobek” (little Bob) by his
team-mates, Lewandowski very quickly
became a part of the team.
“He was a very quiet boy, but only
until the moment he entered the pitch,”
says Siwecki. “He started to fight and
never complained. When you play very
well, older boys accept you at once. It
was the same with Bobek. He always
played as a striker and the ball loved
him, so he scored many goals. The ball
always found him, even during the
corners, when he was the shortest one
among much taller players in the penalty
area. And because he had to fight with
stronger boys that were two years older,
I think that he became strong himself.”
Despite this early success, Krzysztof
began to think about other possibilities
for his son.
“Robert was a very good cross-
country runner, and one day his fatherFirst coaches...Marek
Krzywicki (left) and
Marek Siwecki (right)From the potato
field to Champions
League winner
The story of Robert Lewandowski’s early career,
told by the coaches that knew him first