Speaking on Polish radio, Poland great Zbigniew Boniek was pessimistic over the national team’s chance of making it to the quarter-finals head of the last 16 tie with France, saying Poland had a “1%” chance of winning the game. Boniek was the inspiration for Poland’s last run to the latter stages of a World Cup as his team made the semi-finals in 1986. Following a poor display in losing 2-0 to Argentina in Qatar, Boniek said:
“After such a match, when the players sit down and look in the mirror, they will say: ‘Okay, we won, but I don’t take any satisfaction from such a win.’ If we play a similar game against France and lose in the same way we did against Argentina, then a wave of criticism will pour onto this team. We’ll say that there are no strong players in Poland, that we don’t develop them but these are too far-reaching conclusions. The French are famous for being very strong, but sometimes they can have bad days… But they are extremely dangerous and they’re a completely different team to Argentina… very fast… can we afford to counterattack?”
GWFN
