PROVINCIALE ZEEUWSCHE COURANT said:
NATIONAL THERAPIST
Thursday 25 October 2007 - WARSAW - The national coach's words act like a balm on the fragile Polish soul. Leo Beenhakker, with his trademark bluntness, can say anything to the Polish people since he managed to (nearly) steer the national team to the European Championships for the first time in the Poland's history.
The quality of roads and airports is "dramatic". He had to drag his "boys" to the training sessions "by their hair" at first but they're "far more capable than they think". The Polish public have grown accustomed to Beenhakker's one-liners in the same way the Dutch public has loved and quoted them for years. It still amazes Leo as he sighs at the results of some opinion polls we show him at the lobby of the Sheraton hotel in Warsaw.
The Poles are a pessimistic people by nature and Leo figured that out when he first met his players in July 2006: "The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. That's not true, I keep telling them: 'Maybe the fellows on the other side of the fence look after their grass better than we do but that doesn't mean their grass is any better.'"
Getting that message across is a "full-time job in itself." Polish players are accustomed to authoritarian leadership, Beenhakker explains: "There's a humbleness, a complete lack of personal initiative that you won't find in Holland. It's one of those remaining residues from the Soviet dominated era. After a few weeks of working here, I noticed some players started to walk upright, with more confidence. They were shy boys when I got here, now they're proud men."
The public has noticed the difference. Beenhakker's analyses stretch beyond the world of football and the Polish people have started to refer to him as the 'national therapist' who aims to make the nation gain in self confidence. And it's all a lot more credible since he started to back his theories with results: Poland is now close to qualifying for a European Championship for the first time in history.
It's exactly because Beenhakker has launched a crusade on pessimism, that any warning from 'pope Leo' hits the fan harder than anything any politician might say. When he comes out and tells the nation they need to step up their efforts or Euro2012 will be taken away from them, he hits them where it hurts the most.
Four new stadiums need to be built. Hundreds of kilometers of motorways need to be constructed. But ever since UEFA selected Poland to co-host the tournament with Ukraine, very little has been done. The design for the largest stadium in the capital city has been sent back to the drawing board. Mountains of work await to be moved, but there isn't anyone to do it because the skilled laborers have moved to the West, seeking better pay and benefits.
The minister of sports has already requested UEFA move the deadline from mid 2010 to late 2011. Senior politicians are discussing drastic measures such as importing skilled labor from China, or employing prisoners.
Beenhakker compares the current stadiums to those in Holland in the early 1980s: "It's a process of development. These people have spent most of the 20th century in a universe parallel to our own. You can't expect them to do in ten years what we did in fifty."
Besides, it's not the stadiums that worry Beenhakker the most. Those can be erected in under two years, even without Western know-how. Beenhakker: "The roads are dramatic. Millions of visitors and fans will be attempting to travel across the nation in 2012. They need hotels, airports, roads and public transport and none of those things currently suffice. Solving that problem in under four years won't be easy, but I still believe we can do it."
