New positions, superstitions and dreams of Rio 2016: Rafako Hussars Poland Managing Director Jaroslaw Kolkowski on WSB Season V.

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Rafako Hussars Poland proved to be one of the most courageous teams of WSB Season IV, showing constant steady improvement aided by the sheer measure of the heart of their boxers. We caught up with Managing Director Mr. Jaroslaw Kolowski to talk about the heart and heartache of his side what the future has in store for the Hussars.

Mr Kolkowski, first of all given the rich pool of talent in the WSB how will the Rafako Hussars Poland team have benefitted from boxing against such a high level of opposition last season?

Oh it was a tremendous experience and I am sure that their self-confidence is on a much higher level now because they fought against the very best in the world and they found out that in fact it wasn’t that hard for them. Of course it was sometimes hard but they got better and better every time and in the second half of the season they started winning against these boxers so now they see that even if they face the best they can still prevail. They improved throughout the tournament in a very tough group.

I am pretty sure that now if they faced other boxers, they will be even more confident because they now know that if they fight with 100% of their skill, they will win easily and that is something that you cannot underestimate really.

What do you think the three new franchises from Venezuela, China and Morocco will bring to the competition next season?

I don’t know about the others but I think the team that will definitely lift the overall level of WSB is Venezuela. They have some really good boxers. Some of them have fought for current franchises and they proved throughout last season and the season before that they are very good technically and I think the Venezuelan team is something that we should really keep an eye out for.

There has been talk of Jordan Kulinski and Igor Jakubowski possibly joining your ranks; will we perhaps see some new faces in the Rafako Hussars Poland boxing team for Season V.

Well I think that first of all we’re going to try and compile the best Polish boxers and thanks to the fact that WSB Season V will double as a Rio 2016 Olympic Games qualifying event there is going to be the extra incentive for the boxers to do their best and try to join our team.

We will see some new faces in the coaching setup. Our new head coach will be Jerzy Baraniecki who is a very experienced coach and who worked for us during the past two seasons but as a second coach and also a young coach whose name is Tomasz Rozansky who is a coach of the Poland National Women’s Boxing team and he is very successful in what he is doing, because during the last Youth World Championships he got a gold for Poland (Middleweight Elżbieta Wójcik).

We now have two coaches with two very different approaches to coaching that are cooperating well: one is experienced and from the old school and the other is innovative and open minded. I am pretty sure that next season Rafako Hussars Poland will be much better than last season and we’re going to make some trouble for the others.

What does the new policy for foreign boxers competing in WSB mean to Rafako Hussars Poland?

I think that this is very good and something I can’t wait to see. Needless to say in some of the weight categories we don’t have that many boxers so if we can actually get boxers from other countries then we are 100 per cent for it and we really want to take advantage of this new rule.

I read recently that your captain and star middleweight Tomasz Jablonski has suffered an injury, is it serious?

The injury to Jablonski is not that serious. Tomasz is the best boxer we have, the most hard-working and our real hope to achieve the quota place for the Olympic Games. He wants to train in his own rhythm and that’s one thing but the most important thing is he isn’t seriously injured.

How will the team be preparing for next season?

They will be preparing more or less in the same routine as the past two seasons with the only main difference being we will start a little bit later and gather the boxers in November to begin preparation for the new season. They will be training in Warsaw and we are going to have some new coaches on the team which is going to be great and I think everything will work out just fine.

We wish you and Rafako Hussars Poland all the best for the new WSB Season!

I won’t say thank you, because I am superstitious, but I wish you all the best too!