 One of Poland's key players at the time was Stanisław Terlecki, a forward whose club was ŁKS Łódź. The son of university lecturers, Terlecki held a degree in history from the University of Łódź, as well as fervent anti-communist political views and a strident attitude regarding their display. He was known for openly mocking the establishment with subversive abandon, and regularly made jokes in public about communist authority figures and organisations, prompting the ire of the Polish Football Association (PZPN) and the Warsaw police force. The first Polish international player with a university degree in anything other than physical education, he eschewed the Polish sports magazines read by many of his team-mates on road trips in favour of Western news journals such as Newsweek and Time. Like many Polish intellectuals, he sympathised with movements such as Solidarity; following their example, he twice attempted to unionise Polish footballers during the late 1970s. The PZPN blocked both attempts, banning Terlecki from all organised football each time; first for six months, then for a year.
