Life was tough for a 17-year-old Lewandowski in 2005 when his dad Krzysztof, a European junior champion in judo, died.
Robert had just moved from Delta Warsaw, a small fourth division team, to Legia, one of the best clubs in the country and winners of 14 league titles.
It was supposed to be a major stepping stone in his career and Lewandowski slowly became a regular in Legia’s reserves, but a knee injury stopped his progress in its tracks.
While he was out for a few weeks, Legia made their decision. Lewandowski was not in their future plans any more. At the time, Legia thought they had better strikers and told him to leave.
After he found out, his mum, Iwona, drove him home and made him dinner. But with his professional dream apparently shattered, Lewandowski did not want to eat.
Fortunately, he took a call from third division team Znicz Pruszkow. The club always relied on buying players for little money, improving them and selling them on. As Znicz’s former president Marek Sliwinski put it,, external Lewandowski was their “goldfish”. They paid just £1,000 to buy him from Legia.
At the start, he was far from being Znicz’s biggest star. He earned around £230 per month and there were squad members who were paid three times as much. However, he quickly established himself. He had found a home.
In his first season, he scored 15 goals and helped Pruszkow to promotion. He continued scoring in the second division, too.
In December 2007 Jacek Grembocki took over as coach. “Pruszkow had a decent team and five players from that team made it to the Ekstraklasa [Poland’s top flight],” Grembocki tells BBC Sport. “But, of course, Lewandowski was a mega talent. He had everything: he was hard-working, technical and fast.
“After that knee injury, I think he realised there was no chance at Legia. So in order to become a pro, he had to work hard. And Pruszkow got their superstar.”
After two months, Grembocki became convinced: “We played a friendly game against LKS Lodz, an Ekstraklasa side,” he says. “He was put against experienced Croatian defender Ivan Udarevic. Robert was the best player on the pitch.
“I played seven games for Poland, so I thought it would not be a problem for him to get into the national team. But of course, Bayern? Oh, that would be tough. Now, Lewandowski is the best player in Europe. He gave me a lot of joy.
“Legia made a big mistake. They considered him to be pretty good, but they thought they had better strikers. I coached Lewandowski for two months and saw he could become a player for the national team. In Legia, nobody saw it.”
Thanks to Lewandowski’s goals (21 in total) under Grembocki, Pruszkow became a surprise contender to reach the top flight. In the end, they narrowly missed out on promotion, as they claimed only one point from their last three games. However, it was clear Lewandowski had all it took to play in the top flight and a lot of Ekstraklasa clubs showed their interest.
