Rafał Grotowski (born 18 September 1973 in

Poznań Poznań ( ) is a city on the Warta, River Warta in west Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business center and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John's ...

Wielkopolskie Greater Poland Voivodeship ( ) is a voivodeship, or province, in west-central Poland. The province is named after the region called Greater Poland (''Wielkopolska'' ). The modern province includes most of this historic region, except for some we ...

) is a

field hockey Field hockey (or simply referred to as hockey in some countries where ice hockey is not popular) is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with 11 players in total, made up of 10 field players and a goalk ...

player from

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

, who was a member of the Men's National Team that ended up in twelfth and last place at the

2000 Summer Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad, officially branded as Sydney 2000, and also known as the Games of the New Millennium, were an international multi-sport event held from 15 September to 1 October ...

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

. The team had qualified by surprise for the Games by defeating bigger names like

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

at the

2000 Men's Field Hockey Olympic Qualifier The 2000 Men's Olympic Qualifier was a field hockey tournament held in Osaka, Japan, from 9–20 March 2000. Twelve nations competed at the tournament, with the top seven earning qualification to the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney Sydney i ...

Osaka, Japan is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third-most populous city in Japan, following the special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a populatio ...

References

sports-reference

External links

* 1973 births Living people Polish male field hockey players Olympic field hockey players for Poland 1998 Men's Hockey World Cup players Field hockey players at the 2000 Summer Olympics Field hockey players from Poznań 20th-century Polish sportsmen {{Poland-fieldhockey-bio-stub