Polish League Cup (1999–2002)

The Polish League Cup (Polish: Puchar Ligi Polskiej) was a short lived cup competition in Poland spanning three editions from 1999 to 2002.

For more league cup competitions in Poland, see League Cup in Polish Football.
Polish League Cup
FoundedSummer 1999
AbolishedSummer 2002
Region Poland
Number of teams16 (1999–2000)
36 (2000–2002)
Last championsLegia Warsaw (1st title)
Most successful club(s)Polonia Warsaw (1 title)
Wisła Kraków (1 title)
Legia Warsaw (1 title)

The Polish League Cup was a newly created competition to revive the League Cup in Poland, which was last cancelled 21 years prior in 1978. The competition was presented and pushed by Zbigniew Boniek and Richard Raczkowski. They wanted the competition to have a high interest from the fans and to make games competitive. They did this by giving a large financial bonus for each round the team got into, with the winner earning a total of 1.3 million PLN. The format of the competition changed between its editions. The first edition was a two-legged knockout tournament with the final being a one-off game to win the competition. The second and third editions followed the same format but included teams from the II liga and saw the finals being played over two legs.

Polish League Cup 1999–2000

The first edition of the Polish League Cup only involved those 16 teams in the Ekstraklasa with the competition being a knockout tournament with teams playing each other twice, both home and away. The final was an all Warsaw affair with the game being contested between Polonia Warsaw and Legia Warsaw, with the final being held at Legia's stadium.

Final
Legia Warsaw1–2Polonia Warsaw
Sylwester Czereszewski  38' Igor Gołaszewski  34'
Przemysław Boldt  90'
Referee: Andrzej Czyżniewski

Polonia Warsaw won the 1999–2000 Polish League Cup.[1]

Polish League Cup 2000–2001

The second edition saw the introduction of teams in the II liga, a move which was generally seen as positive for the competitiveness of the competition with the lower league teams often rising to the challenge of those teams in the league above. The final was contested between Zagłębie Lubin and Wisła Kraków, with this years tournament being played over a two-legged final, seeing the finalists playing both home and away.

First-leg
Zagłębie Lubin0–3Wisła Kraków
Łukasz Sosin  32'
Olgierd Moskalewicz  33'
Ryszard Czerwiec  73'
Attendance: 1000
Referee: Grzegorz Gilewski

Second-leg
Wisła Kraków1–2Zagłębie Lubin
Tomasz Frankowski  47' Aleksandr Osipovich  39'
Jarosław Krzyżanowski  53'
Attendance: 5000
Referee: Jacek Granat

Wisła Kraków won the 2000–2001 Polish League Cup winning 4–2 on aggregate.[2][3]

Polish League Cup 2001–2002

The third, and what turned out to be the final Polish League Cup, was again contested between teams from the I liga and II liga. The two finalists were Legia Warsaw and Wisła Kraków, Legia being the losing finalist in the first edition, and Wisła being the winner of the previous edition.

First-leg
Legia Warsaw3–0Wisła Kraków
Tomasz Sokołowski  17'
Radosław Wróblewski  67'
Stanko Svitlica  82'
Attendance: 8000
Referee: Piotr Święs

Second-leg
Wisła Kraków2–1Legia Warsaw
Tomasz Frankowski  31'
Kamil Kosowski  52'		 Moussa Yahaya  76'
Attendance: 7000
Referee: Ryszard Wójcik

Legia Warsaw won the 2001–2002 Polish League Cup winning 4–2 on aggregate.[4]

Winners and finalists
Team Winners Runners-up Winning years
Legia Warsaw112002
Wisła Kraków112001
Polonia Warsaw1-2000
Zagłębie Lubin-1-

Aftermath

As was the case with the League Cup in 1977–1978 the competition resulted in low attendances and low interest from fans. After the third edition the Polish Football Association stated that they would not be organising any further tournaments and the competition was taken off the calendar. A League Cup competition returned again in 2006 with the Ekstraklasa Cup, but that too lasted only three seasons before being taken off the footballing calendar for good.

References
  1. "DRUGIE MISTRZOSTWO POLSKI, PUCHAR POLSKI, PUCHAR LIGI I SUPERPUCHAR". kspolonia.pl.
  2. "Sezon 2001/2002 (piłka nożna)". historiawisly.pl.
  3. "2001.06.03 Wisła Kraków - Zagłębie Lubin 1:2". historiawisly.pl.
  4. "Historia Legii: Puchar Ligi 2002". legionisci.com.
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