The Aston Villa player has just given an interview to “Kanal Sportowy”, in which he admitted that he learned about his lack of selection for the European Championships from the Polish media.
At some point, he began to be completely omitted when selecting the team. Humanly speaking, this case hurts. You get the impression that when we needed Cash, we assumed he was Polish. Until a new coach arrived, who apparently sees no place for “dyed foxes”. What can I say, we turned a footballer into a balloon.
There is no doubt that Cash defends himself in sports. I read a lot of opinions that he didn’t give us much. And ok, I expected more from him. However, to be honest, his long-time competitors in this position are not the saviors of the team either.
I am not a big supporter of downloading the so-called “dyed foxes”, as Franz Smuda once put it. I would prefer that we play with our boys, brought up in Poland. However, someone decided that Matty Cash, due to his origins, could play for Poland. The official machinery was set in motion, the paperwork was completed, and a great victory was announced.
Of course, it can be said that Cash benefited because he played in the national team, and in England, in competition with such aces as Kyle Walker or Trent Alexander Arnold, he would have been at a disadvantage anyway. But did Cash take advantage of Poland? Did he say he didn’t want to come to training camps? NO.
If we have already made Cash a Pole, he should be taken into account when determining the squad. He is unquestionably defending himself in football. I read that he didn’t contribute anything to the team, didn’t play a good match and so on. However, if we look at the statistics from the World Cup in Qatar, in matches against giants such as France, Argentina and also Mexico, he is usually at the forefront when it comes to creating passing lines, crosses, receiving and intercepting. And also sprints at top speed.
An example of such statistics: in the match against Argentina he had the most sprints at speeds above 25 km/h. As many as 47. The second one in our team is ATTENTION! Piotr Zieliński – 41. And the third one, Grzegorz Krychowiak – 30. In the match against France he no longer had such an advantage, but he was still the best in this classification (against Mexico he was third). And in many others. Of course, you can juggle statistics and different positions require different specifics. But these data say something.
It is no accident that I return to these meetings, because then we tested ourselves against the best. Cash competes every day in the most demanding environment in the world, the Premier League. And in a strong team like Aston Villa Birmingham.
Leo Beenhakker liked the phrase “international level”. A footballer at a high international level differs from a footballer at the league level by many technical and motor elements: he plays faster and understands pitch situations better. Generally, most of the features are better developed.
This is crucial in football. The higher you go, the more limitations bother you. You’re too slow, you can’t read the super fast game, you can’t keep up with the action, you can’t win the duel, and so on. There are dozens of these elements. The higher you go, the better developed certain features you need to have.
Richard Grootscholten, who managed academies in the Netherlands and Poland, once said that Polish football players had poorly developed basic skills. “The difference is that on a scale from 1 to 10, both the Pole and the Dutch have their strengths equally, let’s say 8, 9, but the basic ones are different. The Pole is 4, the Dutch is 6.”
This is a partial explanation why the Premier League is not looking for Polish players. They are simply poorly trained. Our clubs release intermediate products too often. It’s not noticeable in league matches or against average opponents, but the higher you go, the more visible these limitations are. Of course, we are able to fight the tycoons from time to time, but it is currently unrealistic.
Coming back to the point, Matty Cash is precisely the player who has a high enough level to play in the Premier League. It keeps up with the intensity and speed of the game there. Meanwhile, we have many players in the squad who cannot even dream of playing at this level.
Of course, there is an accusation that Matty Cash did not learn Polish and, for example, Wilfredo Leon did. This is probably a problem and an argument against it. He could have made an effort and at least learned the basics. I am not able to defend him here that “the Polish language is a difficult language”. The question is whether this is a key argument.
Maybe next time we should just not take players who do not have at least one parent from Poland (Cash meets this condition) or both, and the matter will be clear. No grandmother from Koluszki or great-grandfather from Wołomin. Or he has to pass the Polish language exam. Today I have the impression that as a union and a country we treated Matty instrumentally. Matty has done his job, Matty can go.
