Warsaw opens Poland’s Nations League autumn on Friday 25 September, when Bosnia-Herzegovina arrive for the first match in Group B4 and a possible first international appearance for Mateusz Żukowski. The 24-year-old FC Magdeburg forward has reached the national side amid a prolific spell in Germany’s second tier, where his form has made him one of the country’s most closely watched attacking prospects.
Żukowski has scored 21 goals in 25 matches for Magdeburg and has begun the new season with four in four. Local attention has brought him the “young Lewandowski” label, although Poland’s established reference point remains Robert Lewandowski, the former Barcelona striker who now plays for Chicago Fire and again leads Jan Urban’s squad.
The new call-up is the latest stop in a varied club route for Żukowski. Developed at Lechia Gdańsk, he won both the Polish Cup and Polish Super Cup there before spells with Rangers in Scotland, Lech Poznań and Śląsk Wrocław. Magdeburg has provided the platform for his breakthrough, and the Nations League offers the first chance to carry that scoring record into the international game.
Poland share the group with Bosnia-Herzegovina, Sweden and Romania, in a section that offers a clear route back towards the competition’s top division. They will play six fixtures in all, with winning the group delivering automatic promotion to League A. A return of roughly 13 to 15 points is viewed as the likely requirement for first place, while second would send Urban’s side into a promotion play-off.
After the Bosnia-Herzegovina fixture in Warsaw, Poland travel to Sweden on 28 September before hosting Romania on 2 October. The opening run concludes with the return against Bosnia-Herzegovina away from home on 5 October. Urban’s squad, announced on Friday, carries proven quality but also arrives under scrutiny after Poland failed to qualify for the World Cup in the United States.
