Why didn’t Pepi Bican let him into the dressing room? And why doesn’t Peter Herda drive a taxi and deliver delicacies around Prague?
“I already saw the ball in the goal, so I raised my hands above my head. Šaňo Vencel, however, showed the ball, but my mind remained standing over it. To this day, I don’t know how he managed to go out and keep a clean sheet,” recalls Peter Herda in the next episode of the program Kopačky na hříběku for a chance that could ensure him football immortality in Slavic history.
She did not secure, home goalkeeper Alexander Vencel eliminated her. In the end, Slavia didn’t even get the necessary draw and ended up third in the table after a 0:2 defeat. Behind Ostrava’s Baník and Bratislava’s Slovan.
“Vencel was my curse. I simply didn’t have that, because I never scored against him. On the other hand, Jirka Sedláček from Teplice didn’t like me. I wasn’t surprised by him. I beat him every time I played against him. Once even twice in a few minutes A z penalty kicks on top of that,” Peter Herda, one of Slavia’s great footballers of the 1970s and 1980s, recalls on the microphone of Sportu.cz about his playing career filled with nine seasons in Slavia, a one-year stint in Slovan Bratislava, three summers in Cheb, as well as foreign engagements in Belgium and France.
Petr Herda |
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Born: November 25, 1956 in Jalovce |
Football career: Iskra Partizánské, Topolčany, 1974 – 1983 Slavia Prague, 1983 – 1984 Slovan. Bratislava, 1984 – 1987 RH Cheb, 1987 – 1988 SC Charleroi (Belgium). |
League starts and goals: 334/107 |
Biggest achievements: top scorer of the league in 1982 together with L. Vízek /Dukla) with 15 goals |
– member of the League Gunners Club |
National team starts and goals: 1/0 |
“My older brother Dušan was already playing in Slavia, but I was roped in by Trnava, Žilina and finally Slavia joined. It was only years later that I learned that I had cost her a lot of money at the time, which she had to put together to let me go to Prague, Peter Herda describes the journey to Eden.
“However, I had a great premiere. We arrived with this one in Prague on Friday, where I was supposed to start training with Slavia from Monday. However, on Sunday, the Intercup was played against the French St. Etienne, and coach Jareš offered me to sit on the bench A quarter of an hour before the end, he even sent me to the pitch to show himself to him. As soon as I ran onto the pitch, the rebounded ball reached me and I hit it straight into the crossbar with my left. A great goal. However, after the match, I heard from Pavel Biroš: I’m in Slavia for three years and no one has ever applauded me like you did after a minute on the pitch.”
However, Peter Herda returned in his memories to his football beginnings in Partizánské as the first team in Topolčany, where he already played in the second league for boys at the age of seventeen.
“Many excellent footballers were born and raised in our region. There were four of us from Jalovci alone – me and my brother, Laco Jurkemik and Marián Novotný, who played for Inter Bratislava. And in the surrounding area Jokl, Geleta, Švajlen, Ondruš, Bizoň , Hrušecký. We once calculated that within a radius of five kilometers from our village there were seventeen, eighteen boys, what a league,” recalls Herda, who had football talent from God himself.
Of course, there were also a lot of interesting stories and experiences in the Kicks on the Nail podcast.
“During the 60th birthday celebrations of Prešov football legend Laco Pavlovič, Pepa Bican didn’t want to let me into the dressing room for the team that Pavlovič had invited. Young man, here are the gunners who have scored a hundred or more league goals. You only have ninety-nine, so you’ll wait a little longer ‘so you can be inside with us,’ I heard from him and I had to listen.”
Peter Herda also remembers his time in Bratislava Slovan and reveals years later how it was with the sold and unsold league match with Žilina. She relied on the help of the “Whites”, whom she helped herself to in an emergency the year before, but she did not get a rematch in return. And he also recalls with a smile how, in the Red Star jersey, Cheb didn’t even show any kindness towards Slovan and sent the goal to the second league in the last minute.
But of course there was also a departure abroad. “Originally I was headed to Cyprus, but Slovan’s secretary Janko Fiala suddenly appeared with an offer from Charleroi, Belgium. ‘What would you do in Cyprus? What will they pay you there? Except onions. I have Belgium for you,’ he ordered, within a single day he arranged everything and I moved into a new house. To this day, I can’t let her go.”
However, Peter Herda also talked about life after his football career. About how he worked as a taxi driver in Prague for many years and drove hundreds of thousands of kilometers in the main city. The paradox is all the greater because he never had a passion for cars and he only became a driver in his late thirties in Cheb.
“However, covid came and so I retired. But after two years, I couldn’t stand it at home anymore, I needed to be among the people I had been among all my life. That’s why I found a new job. Similar to the one the late Franta Veselý had. I’ll deliver delicacies, cakes, sandwiches and all kinds of drool-worthy treats. But only for the first three hours,” laughs Peter Herda, reminding us that he can’t debut too much.
In the stands in Eden, where he is a regular guest, he has thoroughly enjoyed Slavist football in recent seasons. I when…
But also “even though” Peter Herda speaks in the podcast Kopačky na hříběku, when it came to this season and the performances and results of the stitched players.
Therefore, listen to the next part of sportu.cz podcasts, it is definitely worth it.