Gdańsk-Trójmiasto Airport is the Champion of Poland

Fighting for third place, Kraków enjoyed an easy win over the Łódź team. The Championship was held on Saturday, 5 July, in the sports hall of the Gdańsk Physical Education and Sports Academy. For the seventh time, 10 teams from Bydgoszcz, Gdańsk, Katowice, Kraków, Łódź, Poznań, Rzeszów, Szczecin, Wrocław and Zielona Góra competed for the champion’s title in the airports tournament.

The airports from Szymany (near Szczytno) and Warsaw failed to participate in the tournament. The teams were first divided into two groups, five teams in each. The two best teams then advanced to the semi-finals. The participants emphasised that the standard of the matches had been improving year by year, which is why victories were increasingly difficult to win. However, the two main favourites competing for the champion’s title were evident from the very start of the tournament.

The teams from Gdańsk and Katowice, as finalists of the previous championships, played in opposing groups. Both teams became group winners. In the semi-finals, Gdańsk defeated Łódź Airport (3-0). With the same score, Katowice easily beat the team from Kraków. Fighting for third place, Kraków beat Łódź 5-0 and it was the Kraków team who took the place on the podium. When the final match kicked off, emotions soared.

The team from Katowice arrived with a group of several dozen fans. Supporters of both teams tried to outdo each other in the cheering stakes. An excellent goalkeeper Waldemar Czapla, who did not let in a single goal in throughout the tournament until the final match, was the trump card of the Katowice team.

In the first half of the final meeting, the game was extremely fierce but the teams failed to score. At the beginning of the second half, the guests from Katowice took the lead 0-1. Having lost a goal, the Gdańsk team started to challenge Czapla’s goal, but right up until the last minute of the game it was the team from Katowice who held the champion’s title.

In the final minute of the match, after a nifty move, Sebastian Letniowski, a forward from the Gdańsk team, equalised 1-1. It was the first goal lost by the Katowice team in the whole tournament. The match ended with a 1-1 tie, and the game would then be decided by a series of three penalty kicks. The players from Gdańsk proved more effective.

The last penalty kick in the series was saved by Radosław Podhorecki, the hosts’ goalkeeper, and it was the Gdańsk team who ultimately won the penalties (2-1) and held the Polish champion’s title. Roman Urbańczyk from Katowice was announced man of the match, and Waldemar Czapla from Katowice was the best goalkeeper. Tomasz Broner from Gdańsk proved to be the best scorer (7 goals).

By tradition, the winning airport holds the next tournament, so the 2004 championship will again be held in Gdańsk. The final classification of the teams participating in the 7th Polish Airports Indoor Soccer Championship 2003 was the following: 1.GDAŃSK 2.KATOWICE 3.KRAKÓW 4.ŁÓD¬ 5.POZNAŃ 6.BYDGOSZCZ 7.WROCŁAW 8.SZCZECIN 9.RZESZÓW 10.ZIELONA GÓRA