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WIZZ MAGAZINE
JUNE-JULY 2012
neighbour, co-hosts Poland. Habsburg, Russian, Polish,
German, Soviet and Ukrainian over the course of
a hundred years, with strong Jewish and Armenian
connections, Lviv developed as a modern metropolis
at the turn of the last century, when its architecture,
houses of culture and local press reflected the
patchwork nature of its citizenship.
As in much of the region, organised sport was
another key factor in Lviv’s transformation from
provincial backwater to major regional capital. Fourth
biggest city in the Habsburg Empire, third biggest in
the post-war Poland of 1920, Lviv can be considered as
the cradle of Polish football. Few may know this, but it
wasn’t Warsaw or Krakow, but Lviv that saw the first
goal scored in an official game between Polish sides.
That honour went to teenager Włodzimierz Chomicki,
who bagged the only goal of a match between
representative teams of Lviv and Krakow at a sports
tournament here in 1894. The date of 14 July was
later registered by the Ukrainian Football Federation
as the official beginning of Ukrainian football, all due
to the city’s changing nationality over the years! This
was also more than 10 years before the first clubs
were founded in Krakow, regarded as pioneers
of the Polish game. Chomicki later went on to
become a sports teacher, and was sent, along
with many of his compatriots, over the border
to modern-day Poland when Lviv became part of the
Soviet Union in 1945.
As a precursor to today’s excitement of scoring
in stoppage time, Chomicki’s achievement was a bit
unspectacular. This 16-year-old lad scored in the sixth
FEATURE
LVIV FOOTBALL
LAST YEAR’S FRIENDLY
OF UKRAINE VS AUSTRIA
AT LVIV ARENA, WHERE
PORTUGAL, LED BY
CHRISTIANO RONALDO
(BELOW), PLAY GERMANY