Grzegorz Lato
Grzegorz Lato ( born April 8, 1950 in Malbork, Poland ) is a former Polish football player. The striker was at the Olympic Games in 1972 with the Polish national team and Olympic gold medalist at the 1974 World Cup tournament with seven goals scorer.
Career
Lato was in the 1970s, one of Europe's best strikers. He played in the small southern Polish club Stal Mielec FCS and changed until the end of his career in the early 1980s to Belgium for SC Lokeren. He had his greatest success with the Polish national team. With 45 goals he is behind Włodzimierz Lubański the best scorer in the Polish national team of all time. His last and 100th for Poland he played in 1984.
In 1972 he won the gold medal with the national team under legendary coach Kazimierz Górski at the Olympic Games in Munich. This was also the first major success of the Polish national team and a prelude to the golden era of the 1970s. With the Football World Cup 1974 in Germany, he was third and was also involved in the Frankfurt water battle. Poland won the match for third place against Brazil 1-0 and Lato scored the only goal. At the same time he was at this World Cup with seven goals scorer.
Lato also took part in the Football World Cup 1978 in Argentina. However, his team was eliminated in the second final round, but at the Football World Cup 1982 in Spain, he was able to repeat the success of 1974. Poland was again third in the petite final against France.
The diminutive striker Lato with thinning hair was one of the most colorful personalities of the great Polish team of the 1970s - next to Kazimierz Deyna and Andrzej Szarmach. The greatest successes of Polish football are directly related to him in context. Although Lato was of powerful build, he shone as a lightning-fast right winger. For the 100 meters he needed handgestoppte 10.8 seconds.
Since 1992, Lato trained several Polish clubs. Besides FKS Stal Mielec his hometown club among other TS Olimpia Poznań, KS Amica Wronki and KS Widzew Łódź.
From 2001 to 2005 Lato sat for the Social Democratic Party SLD in the Polish Senate. In 2007 he stood as a candidate in the general election for a deputy seat in the Sejm, but did not get enough votes.
On 30 October 2008, he was elected president of the Polish Football Association PZPN. End of September 2012 Lato waived for re-election because he was unable to produce the required votes to support and resigned on October 26, 2012 from office.
Coaching career
Achievements
- Olympic gold medal (1972 )
- Olympic silver medal (1976 )
- World Cup bronze medalist (1974, 1982)
- World Cup top scorer (1974 )
- Polish Champion (1973, 1976)
- Polish scorer (1973, 1975)
- Poland's Player of the Year (1974, 1977, 1981)
- CONCACAF Champions Cup (1983 )