Slovakia Celebrates 'Magical' Night

• Uefa.com , Thursday, October 15, 2009 4:30 PM

On a snowy night in Chorzow, Slovakia got the 1-0 result it needed against Poland to qualify for its first World Cup since independence. Poland defender Seweryn Gancarczyk slid an own goal past goalkeeper Jerzy Dudek that proved the decisive goal of the match.

Jan Mucha - who plays his club soccer for Legia Warszawa - was flawless in goal for Slovakia, though he did get a lucky break when Mariusz Lewandowski's strike hit the crossbar. "I love these boys," Slovakia coach Vladimír Weiss said after the final whistle. "In these qualifiers we have played well and had a little bit of luck. Everybody made a contribution and we made the whole of Slovakia happy. This is a fantastic feeling."

"We did something magical; something our country has never done before," concluded the 26-year-old Mucha. "Maybe if we had scored a second - and we had good chance - it would have been less stressful for us, but the most important thing is that the match had a happy end. This is one of the happiest moments of my life. We gave our hearts during this game and through the whole campaign and it paid off."

 

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