Adam Nawałka

Player career

Club

Nawałka comes from a footballing family. His father, Adam, played for the local team Orlęta [Eaglets] Rudawa. Nawałka began his career in 1969 with Wisla Kraków. His debut in the 'ekstraklasa' was on 21 May 1975. He played 190 matches in the highest class of Polish soccer, scoring 9 goals. In 1985, he left Wisla to join the USA club, Polish-American Eagles. He played most of his career for Wisła Kraków. He started having recurrent injuries in the fall of 1978, and despite repeated surgeries, he had to retire from professional soccer in 1984. In 1985, he emigrated to the United States where he played semi-pro soccer at the Polish-American Eagles as well as performing manual labor jobs (like trimming trees around high-voltage power lines). In 1990, he returned to Poland (which had just freed itself from Communism) and started selling Trabant (East German) cars with Volkswagen engines until he received his coaching qualifications in 1995.

National team

He played for the Polish national team (34 matches) and was a participant at the 1978 FIFA World Cup. At the age of 19, he played 90 minutes of every game (except 1) that the Polish team played. At the end of the tournament, he was chosen to the team of the 1978 FIFA World Cup (top 11 players). In the fall of 1978, Nawalka started having recurrent injuries that shortly eliminated him from the national team and shortened his playing career.

Managerial career

After receiving his coaching qualifications he coached the Polish III-rd league team Swit Krzeszowice, after which he held numerous positions at his home club of Wisla Krakow, including head of scouting and sports director, as well as being interim head coach a few times. He went on to manage GKS Katowice and later Górnik Zabrze. On 26 October 2013, the Polish FA president Zbigniew Boniek, announced that Nawałka would replace Waldemar Fornalik as the new manager of the Polish national team. At the time of the appointment, his side Górnik Zabrze was riding the Polish League. He remained with Zabrze until 1 November, and focused on the national team after the game against Cracovia. On 11 October 2014, he recorded an upset by defeating Germany with 2–0 in their home Euro 2016 qualifier. He took Poland to their first Euro quarterfinal.

Managerial statistics

As of match played 4 September 2017