Gunārs Ulmanis (1938 – 17 July 2010) was a Latvian football right wing midfielder, one of the most famous Latvian footballers of the 1960s.

Biography

While at school Ulmanis played both

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

and

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

but the famous Latvian football coach Vadims Ulbergs persuaded him to devote himself entirely to football. For his first team in the regional competition Ulmanis scored 60 out of the team's 78 goals and was called up to the flagship of Latvian football -

Daugava Rīga FK Daugava Rīga was a Latvian football club, based at the Daugava Stadium in Riga. They played in the Latvian Higher League. The last manager of the team was Armands Zeiberliņš. From the club's foundation in 2003 till 2009 the club was kno ...

. In his first game for Daugava - an international game against Polish

GKS Katowice GKS Katowice (; GKS stands for , ) is a Polish professional football club based in Katowice. They currently compete in the Ekstraklasa in the 2024–25 season after gaining promotion from the I liga in 2024. History In 1963 in Katowice a spe ...

- Ulmanis scored 3 goals. He was popular among Latvian football fans for his "lazy" and relaxed playing manner which he was able to alter with unexpected outbursts of energy in form of shots on goal or passes to the center. His popularity was partly also connected with his last name Ulmanis (the same as former Latvian president

Kārlis Ulmanis Kārlis Augusts Vilhelms Ulmanis (; 4 September 1877 – 20 September 1942) was a Latvian politician and a dictator. He was one of the most prominent Latvian politicians of pre-World War II Latvia during the Interwar period of independence from N ...

) which also brought him troubles with the Soviet authorities. He played for Daugava for almost his entire career - from 1955 until 1969, scoring many important goals and having been elected the team captain. After he was suspended from Daugava in 1969 after Soviet customs officers found an excess of cash he was carrying on his way to a friendly in the

East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...

, he spent years as player-manager for Rīgas radiorūpnīca ("Radiotehniķis") until 1982. Until the late 1980s, Ulmanis was a milling-machine operator, before starting a career in coaching, as he was a coach in

FK Pārdaugava FK Pārdaugava was a Latvian football club based in Riga. It was founded in 1984 as Daugava-RVR, the youth team of FK Daugava Riga and became defunct in 1995. In 1991 it replaced FK Daugava and played in the Soviet First League. It completed ...

1991–1995) and the Riga Football School academy since 1996. He died on 17 July 2010 at the age of 71.

References

1938 births 2010 deaths Latvian men's footballers FC Daugava Riga players Men's association football forwards Soviet men's footballers Soviet Top League players {{Latvia-footy-bio-stub