Petr Janečka

* 1957

  • "I played and didn't play. I got the ulcers the most. I actually missed the Olympics in Moscow with the Hungarians in Strahov. After that match, I immediately went to a friendly match in Spain, where we played 2:2. Butragueño and the others also played there. I don't remember who else anymore. We played 2:2. I set up Zdeňa Nehoda for two goals, but then Europe and the Olympics came, and I got ulcers before that, and I didn't go anywhere." – "Nowhere. And what were the ulcers from?" – "I've had them since I was a child, from the age of five. Ancestral." – "Did they burst normally? Could you have been glad to be alive?" – "It already burst four or five times. I already knew what it was. When it burst before the Olympics, it was the worst. I was lying in the hospital in Zlín, in Gottwaldov, for an infusion. Whatever I ate, I vomited. I was lying there for 14 days, and I lost 14 kilos. I said: 'I'm going home. I want to die at home.'"

  • "The match against Hungary was played in Strahov. The stadium was completely full. It was thrilling, and in the end, you won 3:2. The match went well for you, so say something about it." – "We scored the first goal in the 13th minute after a corner, Zdeňa Rygel crossed from the left side. It was a while after the corner because Luďa Macela was there. It had to be after the corner. Otherwise, he wouldn't have gone there. Zdeňa kicked it on the line, I'm standing behind Luďa, and he shouts: 'Let go!' I hit the ball with my left foot, the goalkeeper was two meters away, and he couldn't even raise his hands. They scored, it seems to me, 1:1, then we scored 2:1. I was running, two Hungarians were hanging on to me, and I ran to the large line and fell there. Penalty, so Láďa Vízek converted it. Then it was 3:1, and I went around the goalkeeper from the left side. That was the attack of Vízek, Liček, Janeček. I said to myself: 'Score a goal too, Verner!'"

  • "At that time, Töröscik, Nyalasi, Dunai, Fazekas played for Dózsa Ujpest. We were crushing them at home. We scored two goals. And we equalized at 2:2. But there, it was something completely different. Ten thousand people came from Brno, 200 buses or whatever. We defeated them, and all the buses went home without windows." – "That the Hungarians destroyed them?" – "They threw cobblestones at them through the windows. Not at us." – "But they threw at the fans?" – "At those buses. Besides, they didn't have the rear windows broken, and the drivers put them in from the back to the front."

  • Celé nahrávky
  • 1

    Praha, 16.08.2022

    (audio)
    délka: 01:56:10
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Tipsport for Legends
  • 2

    Praha, 29.08.2022

    (audio)
    délka: 30:09
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Tipsport for Legends
Celé nahrávky jsou k dispozici pouze pro přihlášené uživatele.

Loser, alcoholic, bum. But also the player, who was applauded by 107 thousand of people

Petr Janečka in the national team jersey at the beginning of the 1980s
Petr Janečka in the national team jersey at the beginning of the 1980s
zdroj: witness archive

Petr Janečka was born on 25 November 1957 in Gottwaldov, today‘s Zlín. He was the youngest son of a large family. Both mother and father worked as laborers in the Baťa company, which in 1949 became the Svit company. As a child, Petr Janečka was interested in football and athletics, excelling in sprints and long jumps. At 12, he played in a team with fifteen-year-old footballers in the TJ Gottwaldov club. Because of sports, he did not finish school and started working. At 19, he became the top scorer in the third league and transferred to Zbrojovka Brno. In the premier league season, he scored 13 goals, assisted on another 15, and helped the team to the only championship title in history. In 1978, he debuted on the national team. He played 39 matches there and scored nine goals. In the spring of 1980, he was one of the mainstays of the national team, which was preparing for the European Championships in Italy and the Olympic Games in Moscow. He ended up in the hospital in a serious condition just before the two top tournaments in which Czechoslovakia won bronze and gold. His stomach ulcers betrayed him – a family curse that cost him the European Championships and the Olympics. He nevertheless qualified for the 1982 World Cup in Spain with the national team. But Czechoslovakia lost unluckily in the group stage. In the same year, he scored a goal in Brazil when he equalized to 1:1 in a match against the home team. In 1983, Zbrojovka was relegated from the first league, and Petr Janečka left for Prague Bohemians. He won third place with them in the season of 1983/84 and second place the next year. In the autumn of 1984, he helped to defeat Ajax Amsterdam with stars van Basten, Koeman, and Rijkaard in the UEFA European Cup. In 1987, an affair with black money broke out in Bohemians, the criminal investigation also investigated Petr Janečka, but he exited unscathed. During his involvement with Bohemians, he passed his high school diploma. In November 1987, he transferred to the Belgian club Racing Brussels, where he played a year in the first league and a year in the second league. In the same year, he ended his engagement with the national team. After returning to Czechoslovakia, he played briefly in Gottwaldov, ending his professional career in Tulln, Austria. Thanks to 105 goals in the Czechoslovak first league and 4 in the Belgian first league, he got into the prestigious Shooters Club. In the nineties, he lost his savings, fell into alcoholism, and his family fell apart. He became homeless. He was helped by former teammates from Zbrojovka Brno, Bohemians, and Gottwaldov, as well as the fans. In 2022, he lived in a hostel in Prague, which he paid for with an annuity provided by the Tipsport Foundation.