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IPA Poland
Five-a-side
Football tournament
in honour of Polish Police Officer – Andrzej
STRUJ who was murdered in 2010.
Travel plans for the UK’s team of 12 went a little better than last year, with the team travelling to Warsaw
from Belfast, Liverpool and Stansted. This year’s only problem was that the ceremony had commenced a little
bit earlier than planned, and before the group from Stansted arrived. This was not a problem as the rest of the
team had arrived and marched in behind the Union Jack flag representing Section UK, followed by the rest of
the team who had to sneak into the sports hall behind the others.
W
hat an attendance of teams, there were 65 teams
participating this year. 50 Polish teams and 15 international
teams. Seven of these were ladies teams taking part in their
tournament; maybe next year we could get a UK ladies team to take part.
Four Sports centres were being used this year and our group was playing at
the Arena Ursynow. Our group consisted of 4 Polish Police teams, 1 Polish
armed forces team and 1 Moldovan Police team.
The opening ceremony finished with 4 fully armed military abseilers coming
from the roof beams carrying a large red box containing the prize trophy for
the men’s football finalists.
Section UK played 5 games and all teams had one bye due to one Polish
Police team dropping out.
At this point I have to say the team played extremely well throughout the
tournament but we were just beaten by better teams.
Game one
we lost 2-0 to Dwodztwo Generalne Rodzaju Sil Zbrojnych
Game two
we lost 6-0 to Moldova
Game three
we lost 2-0 to Wyzsza Szkola Policji W Szczytnie
Game four
we lost 4-1 to Komenda Wojewodzka Policji W Poznaniu.
The only goal scored by our team in the tournament was a cracking
goal put in the back of the net by Tom Harper.
Game five
we lost 4-0 to Reprezentacja Komendanta Glownego Policji
Game six
was our claim to fame that we did not lose but got a bye.
Unfortunately we were knocked out and could only watch the final play offs
and finals the next day. Again it was a tremendous finals day which was won
by Lodz Fire Service who beat Belarus 1 – 0.
It is nice to win but as one player from the tournament stated it’s the taking
part that counts especially as this tournament is in memory of a murdered
Police Officer.
Thanks go out to Nottinghamshire IPA Branch for the donation used for gifts
that were given to our opponents before each game, along with thanks to
PSNI and Nottinghamshire Police for presentation badges and plaques.
Andre Bak
.
POLICE WORLD
Vol 62 No. 2, 2017
6
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