Matchups in Poland include a battle of the unbeatens

The Polish Liga Futbolu Amerykańskiego, LFA, rolls into its third weekend of play in this shortened 2020 season with the defending champion Wroclaw Panthers unbeaten in two games and looking overpowering this early in the season.

This week’s two games have the 1-0 Bydgoszcz Archers playing host to the 1-0 Bialystok Lowlanders and the 1-1 Tychy Falcons on the road for the second week in a row facing the Silesia Rebels (0-2).

Saturday, September 19, Bialystok Lowlanders (1-0) @ Bydgoszcz Archers (1-0)

Both teams come into this game undefeated and both teams will have new quarterbacks for this game.

The Archers enter this game in some disarray after losing their starting quarterback Luke Zetazate who has stepped away. His replacement is Dustin Hawke Willingham who has led both the Oslo Vikings (Norway) and Bolzano Giants (Italy) to the playoffs and has been Team USA’s quarterback. Meanwhile, Bialystok’s quarterback, Jon Mullin, has also departed and been replaced by Brandon Gwinner who is fresh off of leading his team, the Wasa Royals, to the Finnish semifinals.

Bydgoszcz’s  opening game win, 17-7, was against the winless Warsaw Mets, but the score should have been higher. They fumbled the ball once which led to an immediate touchdown and had a ball picked off on the goalline, preventing another touchdown.  Zetazate threw two first half touchdown passes, one to Paweł Fabich and the other to Mikołaj Obrebski while Kornel Witkowski kicked a 34 yard field goal. Other standouts for Bydgoszcz were French running back Meril Zero and free safety Cezary Szczerba. 

The Archers have also added Finnish championship winning linebacker Kadel King of the Kuopio Steelers. King spent the 2019 season with the Frankfurt Universe of the German Football League.

Meanwhile Bialystok looked impressive in the 38-14 win over the Silesia Rebels in their opening game of the season. Running back Glen Toonga led the way with a monster performance, rushing for 254 yards and four touchdowns as the Rebels had no answer. Rafał Królewski scored the other two touchdowns for Bialystok, both pass receptions and one a 57 yarder.

In addition to Gwinner, the Lowlanders have also added defensive back Tommy Kaczocha from the Finnish title winning Kuopio Steelers.

Sunday, September 20, Tychy Falcons (1-1) @ Silesia Rebels (0-2)

The Rebels will be looking to score their first win of the season in front of their home crowd Sunday when they face the Tychy Falcons, who are fresh off of their first victory of the year.

Both team have suffered lopsided defeats at the hands of the Wroclaw Panthers.

Silesia was beaten in their first game of the year by the Lowlanders 38-14 and then was soundly thrashed 52-7 by the powerful Wroclaw Panthers. The Falcons were also beaten badly by Wroclaw  (52-0) but rebounded last week to defeat the Warsaw Mets 16-0.

Silesia Rebels British quarterback Ashley Bailey looked impressive at times in the team’s opening game loss to Bialystok. He threw for 206 yards and one touchdown (20 yards) in that game while rushing for 101 yards and scoring the other touchdown for the Rebels. Against the Panthers defense it was tougher and the Silesia offense wasn’t able to find the end zone until late in the contest with the score 52-0. Bailey connected with Devion Young for the game’s final touchdown. However, that combination along with the running of Courtney Ettiene, could be the difference in this game.

The Tychy Falcons had to work hard in their 16-0 win over Warsaw but the combination of quarterback Niklas Gorny and receiver Rashad Still was a constant threat. Add to the the running of Adrian Binek and Jan Szwej and the Rebels defense will be under some pressure. The Falcons defense held Warsaw to 138 yards of offense, almost all of it inside the Mets half of the field. If they can keep Bailey bottled up the way they did TJ Richardson last week, they will have a chance of winning this game.