EURO2012: Poland leave it late against Latvia

Poland left it late to score the only goal of the poor game with Latvia on Tuesday night. With eight minutes left, the 21-year-old Hannover striker Artur Sobiech came off the bench to head home a cross by Sivasspor winger Kamil Grosicki, in a match played in a near-empty Woertherseestadion stadium.

Poland fielded an experimental line-up that did not feature the likes of Robert Lewandowski, Wojciech Szczesny, Lukasz Piszczek or Jakub Blaszczykowski as the Polish manager Franciszek Smuda tested his fringe players ahead of the finals.

Indeed, the purpose of what was essentially a training match was to identify three of Smuda’s 26-man squad to drop, before his final squad is announced.

Arsenal reserve keeper Lukasz Fabianski, stood in for team-mate Szczesny and much to Smuda’s displeasure he was the busier goalkeeper as Latvia looked dangerous on the break.

It was goalless at half-time and the second half continued to serve up sub-standard fare.

Trabzonspor forward Pawel Brozek - who barely figured in a six-month loan spell at Celtic this season, was another experimental starter for Poland in this game. His poor display will ensure he will not be a starter in the Euro Championships and may even threaten his place in the squad.

The match degenerated into a scrap, with several players booked and a rash of substitutions breaking up the play, but finally Poland made the breakthrough when Grosicki clipped in a fine right-footed cross that Sobiech rose to flick past Dorosevs, in the Latvian goal.

That sparked the Poles into a late surge of attacking play but they were unable to find a second.

Poland play Slovakia in their next Euro 2012 warm-up on Saturday, and they are expected to field a first-choice line-up for that clash