Michal Pazdan is a Polish professional footballer who plays as a centre-back for Ekstraklasa club Legia Warsaw. Club career
Pazdan began his football career at Hutnik Krakow. He gradually made his way up the ranks and became part of the main team in the 2003–04 season. In 2007, he joined Gornik Zabrze. He debuted in the Ekstraklasa on 14 September 2007 with Jagiellonia Bialystok against Polonia Bytom. During that season he appeared 19 times for the club, 17 of those as a starter, and helped his team finish in 8th place that season. On 24 June 2015, Pazdan joined Legia Warsaw. International career
Pazdan has earned 9 caps for the Poland national football team. He made his debut on 15 December 2007 in a 1–0 friendly win against Bosnia and Herzegovina. Poland manager, Leo Beenhakker, called him up to participate in the 23-man squad at Euro 2008, however, along with lukasz Gargula, he was the only player not to have played a single minute. As of late, Pazdan has only been called up as a reserve for any players that may get injured, he was, however, called up on 21 November 2008 for friendly matches in Antalya, Turkey. During Euro 2016, Pazdan became a national hero after the game against World Champions, Germany, where he was pronounced as Man of the match and led the team to a draw, which helped Poland to qualify for the knockout stages of the tournament for the first time in history. His performances also led to reported interest from Premier League clubs. Poland then beat Switzerland on penalties to qualify for the quarter finals; however, Pazdan and the Polish defence conceded their first goal of the tournament to Xherdan Shaqiri. |
