Przemyśl handball wants to return to the elite

February 19, 2020
10:43 pm

Not many people know this, but Przemysl sport could lose its handball team. However, Czuwaj has a new sponsor (Orlen Upstream) and a great determination to regain Super League for the city.

Cities need sports to thrive. For many reasons. Sport, at this basic level, is all about proper physical and ethical human development. Every preventive health program includes sports, movement. However, this is only part of a larger puzzle in building a modern community. Modern sport has not only a purely physical dimension. It is also a complex business and economic mechanism, which, if rationally developed, has a chance to be an impulse for development. Sport means jobs: those for coaches, people directly operating training or entertainment facilities. This is not all, after all, sport is a spectacle that attracts people, both those from the immediate region and visitors from other parts of the country. This is most often the case with national league games. In the case of the PGNiG Superleague, we have 24 rounds in a season, plus Cup matches and possible participation in international competitions - this is a dozen or so big events in Przemyśl, to which people will come, wanting to eat somewhere, rest, often returning later with a completely different purpose, when they have grown fond of the city or the region.

Is handball such an opportunity? Czuwaj Przemyśl gives hope that it is. It is not only a professional team but also youth groups. So far they have been run reasonably, despite a modest budget.

Despite the fact that our resources were among the lowest 36 teams, during the last 3 years we have won the title of vice-champions of the 1st league twice. This would not have been possible without the hard, social work of many people who care about the development and popularization of sport, especially among children and young people from the area of Przemyśl and its surroundings - explains Robert Skawiński, the President of the Association of Sports Development "Przemyśl".

Unfortunately, in the second half of last year the financial situation of the Association became dramatic. In connection with the reduced funding from the city and the need to incur fees for the use of the sports hall by youth and senior groups, which oscillate around 4-6 thousand zł per month, the club faced the specter of discontinuation of our statutory activities and thus the withdrawal of our team from the competition.

However, the Marshal Marek Kuchciński reacted to our request for help. It was only thanks to his efforts that we were able to start negotiations regarding the sponsorship with ORLEN Upstream company, which conducts its business activity in the vicinity of Przemyśl. Many months of negotiations ended with a great success and from the beginning of January this year, for the first time in history, our team has a title sponsor! This is an incredible thing for the entire sport in Przemyśl and for the local community. Thanks to the invaluable help of the Marshal we can focus on our statutory activity, having at our disposal the budget of the average first-league level', rejoices president Skawiński.

The funds obtained will also allow for the further development of extremely talented members of youth groups who have been "ruling" indivisibly in Podkarpacie for 2 years, leaving in the dust their peers from, among others, super-league Stal Mielec. Over 50 young handball adepts will continue training under the guidance of one of the best youth coaches in Poland, Mr. Piotr Kroczek, with a view to playing on first league courts.
So the first team is starting to think about returning to Super League. The results on the court show that even with a small budget they do not differ in level from the teams from the bottom part of the table of the highest competition class, but they still have a lot of work ahead of them in terms of organization and finances. Fans and entrepreneurs hope that these great sporting ambitions will translate into promotion and development of handball in the city and the area. "Handball is already one of the most popular disciplines in the country. Following the example of soccer, clubs are being set up for children and young people who, seeing with their own eyes the success of local teams and the national team, dream of a career.