Leonard Franciszek Piątek (born Leonard Franz Piontek, 3 October 1913 – 1 July 1967) was a Polish

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who played as a

forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

in the interwar period. In the spring of 1937 he changed his name to Leonard Franciszek Piątek (a Polonized version). A hard-working and ambitious forward, Piątek was the top scorer for Polish first division vice-champions ''

AKS Chorzów AKS Chorzów is a sports club based in Chorzów, Poland. It is one of the earliest sports organizations in Upper Silesia and is still well-known nationally for its football and handball teams. The club also made its mark on the international stage: ...

'' in 1937 and went on to lead the league the following season with 21 goals. He represented the Polish national side on 16 occasions between 1937 and 1939, scoring 11 goals. He scored twice in Poland's 4–0 win over

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label=Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavija ...

in a World Cup qualifier and took part in the legendary

1938 FIFA World Cup The 1938 FIFA World Cup was the third edition of the World Cup, the quadrennial international football championship for senior men's national teams and was held in France from 4 June until 19 June 1938. Italy defended its title in the final, beat ...

match against

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

in (

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

on 5 June 1938, which Brazil won 6–5. Piątek also scored a goal in the last international match played in Poland before the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, a 4–2 victory over

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia a ...

on 27 August 1939. Piątek signed the

Volksliste The Deutsche Volksliste (German People's List), a Nazi Party institution, aimed to classify inhabitants of Nazi-occupied territories (1939-1945) into categories of desirability according to criteria systematised by ''Reichsführer-SS'' Heinrich H ...

(

German Nationality List The Deutsche Volksliste (German People's List), a Nazi Party institution, aimed to classify inhabitants of Nazi-occupied territories (1939-1945) into categories of desirability according to criteria systematised by ''Reichsführer-SS'' Heinrich Hi ...

) after the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

invasion of Poland during

which allowed him to continue his footballing career. His club ''AKS Chorzów'' was now playing as ''Germania Königshütte'' and with Piątek as their key player the team dominated the first division ''Gauliga Schlesien'' – part of the German football league system – throughout the early 1940s far outperforming state-supported rivals ''

1. FC Katowice The 1. FC Katowice is a Polish football club from Katowice, Silesian Voivodeship and was founded in 2007 as a reactivation by the Silesian Autonomy Movement of the 1945 dissolved 1. FC Kattowitz. Men's football team The club was reactivated i ...

''.http://na-spalonym.pl/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=302&Itemid=326 After war he played at AKS Chorzów until the end of the 1947–season, and moved to Pogoń Katowice, where he played from 1947 until 1950.

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