Tomasz Mariusz Rząsa (; born 11 March 1973) is a Polish former professional

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 ...

who primarily played as a left back and sometimes as a

left midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

Club career

During his career, Rząsa represented

Cracovia Cracovia is the Latin name for the Polish city of Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh cen ...

and Sokół Pniewy ( pl) (Poland),

Grasshoppers Grasshoppers are a group of insects belonging to the suborder Caelifera. They are among what is possibly the most ancient living group of chewing herbivorous insects, dating back to the early Triassic around 250 million years ago. Grasshop ...

(Switzerland),

Lugano Lugano (, , ; lmo, label=Ticinese dialect, Ticinese, Lugan ) is a city and municipality in Switzerland, part of the Lugano District in the canton of Ticino. It is the largest city of both Ticino and the Italian-speaking southern Switzerland. Luga ...

(Switzerland), Young Boys (Switzerland), De Graafschap (Netherlands),

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional football club (association football), football club in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the club changed to various names bef ...

(Netherlands),

Partizan Partizan may refer to: Sport * JSD Partizan, a sports society from Belgrade, Serbia, which includes the following clubs: **AK Partizan, athletics ** Biciklistički Klub Partizan, cycling ** Džudo Klub Partizan, judo **FK Partizan, association fo ...

(Serbia),

Heerenveen Heerenveen (, fry, It Hearrenfean ) is a town and municipality in the province of Friesland (Fryslân), in the Northern Netherlands. In 2021, the town had a population of 29,790 (1 January) while the municipality had a population 50,859 (1 July). ...

(Netherlands), ADO Den Haag (Netherlands) and Ried (Austria). While playing with Grasshoppers, he won two

Swiss National League Swiss may refer to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland *Swiss people Places * Swiss, Missouri *Swiss, North Carolina *Swiss, West Virginia *Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses *Swiss-system tournament, in various games and sports *Swiss International ...

championships, in 1994–95 and 1995–96 seasons. He played for Feyenoord between 1999 and 2003, where he failed to win any domestic title with the club, but did win the 2001–02 UEFA Cup, by beating

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional fo ...

in the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: * Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of con ...

. Consequently, they played the

2002 UEFA Super Cup The 2002 UEFA Super Cup was played on 30 August 2002 between Real Madrid of Spain and Feyenoord of the Netherlands. Real Madrid qualified by beating Bayer Leverkusen in the 2002 UEFA Champions League Final. Feyenoord had made it to the Super Cu ...

, but lost against Real Madrid. Rząsa played both finals. With Partizan, he was the newcomer alongside

Ljubinko Drulović Ljubinko Drulović (; born 11 September 1968) is a Serbian former professional footballer who played as a winger, and is a current manager. He spent the most notable part of his playing career in Portugal, with stints at Porto and Benfica – ...

, Taribo West and others, where he helped the club reach the Champions League

group stage A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concen ...

. In 2006, he came to Austria and signed with SV Ried, where he was decisive in helping them to achieve their greatest ever result – finishing as runners-up in the 2006–07 Austrian Bundesliga. He played an impressive 58 league matches in just two seasons with Ried.

International career

Rząsa represented

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...

in 36 international matches between 1994 and 2006, and scored one goal. He was part of the Polish team at the

2002 FIFA World Cup The 2002 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Korea Japan 2002, was the 17th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial football world championship for men's national teams organized by FIFA. It was held from 31 May to 30 June 2002 at sites in South Korea an ...

Coaching career

Upon finishing his playing career, he was an assistant manager at Lech Poznań under

Maciej Skorża Maciej Skorża (; born 10 January 1972) is a former Poles, Polish professional Association football, footballer. He is currently the Manager (association football), manager of J1 League club Urawa Red Diamonds. Club career He was playing as a def ...

during the 2014–15 season, and under Rafał Ulatowski in May 2018.

Career statistics

:''Scores and results list Poland's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Rząsa goal.''

Honours

Grasshoppers * Swiss Super League: 1995–96, 1996–97 Feyenoord *

Johan Cruijff Shield The Johan Cruyff Shield (, ) is a football trophy in the Netherlands named after Dutch footballer Johan Cruyff, also often referred to as the Dutch Super Cup. The winner is decided in one match only, played by the winner of the national footbal ...

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

UEFA Cup A cup is an open-top used to hold hot or cold liquids for pouring or drinking; while mainly used for drinking, it also can be used to store solids for pouring (e.g., sugar, flour, grains, salt). Cups may be made of glass, metal, china, clay ...

: 2001–02

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rzasa, Tomasz 1973 births Living people Footballers from Kraków Polish footballers Association football fullbacks Poland international footballers Poland youth international footballers Poland under-21 international footballers UEFA Cup winning players 2002 FIFA World Cup players MKS Cracovia (football) players Sokół Pniewy players Grasshopper Club Zürich players FC Lugano players BSC Young Boys players De Graafschap players Feyenoord players FK Partizan players SC Heerenveen players ADO Den Haag players SV Ried players II liga players I liga players Ekstraklasa players Swiss Super League players Eredivisie players First League of Serbia and Montenegro players Austrian Football Bundesliga players Polish expatriate footballers Polish expatriate sportspeople in Switzerland Expatriate footballers in Switzerland Polish expatriate sportspeople in the Netherlands Expatriate footballers in the Netherlands Expatriate footballers in Serbia and Montenegro Polish expatriate sportspeople in Austria Expatriate footballers in Austria