1028 Kamil Grosicki

Biography

Polish international Kamil Grosicki was a right-footed left winger that joined Marco Silva’s Tigers for a £9 million fee on the January 2017 transfer deadline day, adding width, pace and flair to the Tigers’ relegation battle. Grosicki frightened Premier League defences with his raw pace before puzzling those same defences with a highly variable end product.  Kamil provided vital assists in victories against West Ham United, Middlesbrough and Watford – he also took a fine free kick and only the woodwork denied his opening goal for City in April 2017 at Southampton. 

The 2017/18 season saw Grosicki score plenty of goals early on, opening his Tigers account in August 2017 against Burton Albion and netting five more times by December 2017. But as the challenge of a Championship relegation battle loomed and a broken hand sustained on Boxing Day sidelined him for six weeks, Kamil’s club form dipped and he spent the closing months mostly performing an impact substitute role for Nigel Adkins. In April 2018 he started the away fixture against Burton Albion and punished the Brewers again with two goals.

Kamil returned late from his 2018 World Cup Finals exploits and at the start of the 2018/19 season he inhabited the fringes of the City first team squad. During this period he fished for a transfer but was rehabilitated in the first eleven by September 2018 and was a dominant threat as City mounted an unlikely climb up the table. Indeed the 2018/19 season was Grosicki’s best and most effective in black and amber, pinnacling when he scored braces in successive March/April 2019 matches against Ipswich Town and Reading.

This fine form continued into the 2019/20 season under the management of Grant McCann, Grosicki was widely regarded as one of the Championship’s biggest attacking goalscoring threats as well as a fecund supply line of assists – he scored seven goals before Christmas. In January 2020 Grosicki was nearing the end of his City contract, on terms that were reputed to be more akin to the Premier League than the Championship.  He played his last game for City just a week shy of three years after his debut and joined Championship rivals West Bromwich Albion on transfer deadline day for a £1 million fee. Grosicki’s importance to the Tigers was evident when they slumped from the fringes of the play-offs to the foot of the table over the remainder of the season.

Kamil Pawel Grosicki was born in Szczecin, a lakeside city in north west Poland close to the Baltic Sea and the border with Germany. He came through the junior ranks at local Ekstraklasa league side Pogon Szczecin and scored regularly for the second team during the 2005/06 season before making his first team debut in May 2006 against Arka Gdynia. He continued to develop during the 2006/07 season, scoring his first goal for the club against Gornik Leczna in September 2006 and earning a regular start as the season wore on. However despite Grosicki’s promise, Szczecin compiled a twenty-one match winless run from October 2006 onwards that saw the side slump to the bottom of the league table – the resulting financial meltdown saw the side relegated several divisions and Grosicki was seeking pastures new after scoring two goals in 23 appearances for Pogon Szczecin.

In June 2007 Kamil joined Polish Ekstraklasa side Legia Warsaw. He made his debut for the Legionaries in July 2007 against Cracovia and scored his first goal for the club a month later against Zaglebie Sosnowiec. However by November 2007 he was out of the team and receiving therapy for a gambling addiction that had placed him in considerable debt. In February 2008 he joined Swiss Super League side FC Sion on a loan until the end of the calendar year, scoring two goals in 8 appearances for the senior side and a further six goals in 7 appearances for the Under-21 side that included an August 2008 hattrick against UGS Geneve. He returned to Legia Warsaw at the end of 2008 but did not find his way back into the first team. In February 2009 Grosicki was loaned out again to Ekstraklasa league rivals Jagiellonia Bialystok, where he scored four goals in 13 appearances during the remainder of the season, By the 2009 close season Kamil had scored one goal in 12 appearances for Legia Warsaw during his two year spell with the club.

In July 2009 Jagiellonia Bialystok paid a modest fee to sign Grosicki on a permanent deal. The transfer proved a great success and Kamil was a first eleven regular throughout the 2009/10 season, added ten assists to his five goals as Bialystok finished in mid-table after a poor start to the season. Grosicki also claimed a Polish Cup winners’ medal when Bialystok defeated his resurgent former side Pogon Szczecin in the May 2010 final. Kamil began the 2010/11 season by making his first appearance in European competition, a July 2010 Europa League tie against Aris Salonika, and by helping his side win the August 2010 Superpuchar curtain raiser between League and Cup victors. He continued to perform outstandingly during the first half of the season, his last appearance for the club against Ruch Chorzow in November 2010 took his tally for Jagiellonia to eleven goals in 56 appearances.

In January 2011 Grosicki signed for Turkish Super Lig side Sivasspor, a 900,000 euro fee being paid for his services. He made his January 2011 debut against Galatasaray and netted his first goal in February 2011 against Bursaspor. A hattrick later that month against Manisaspor announced Grosicki’s arrival in the Turkish league and he ended the season with five goals. Grosicki was a vital part of the Sivasspor side that finished in the upper reaches of the Super Lig in the 2011/12 season and qualified for the end of season Europa League play-offs. That form continued into the 2012/13 season as Sivasspor reached the semi-finals of the Turkish Cup only to lose over two legs to Trabzonspor. An injury sidelined him for much of the first half of the 2013/14 season and he had only just returned to first team action in December 2013 when he made his last appearance for Sivasspor, taking his tally to sixteen goals in 104 appearances.

In January 2014 French Ligue 1 side Stade Rennais, aka Rennes, paid around 800,000 euros for Grosicki’s transfer to Brittany in north west France. He made his February 2014 debut against Olympique Lyonnais and scored his first goal for Rennes in a March 2014 Coupe de France tie against LOSC Lille. He played in the May 2014 Coupe de France final that Rennes lost to Guingamp. Kamil was part of the Rennes first team squad during the 2014/15 season though a hand injury sidelined him between November 2014 and February 2015. He returned to form in the 2015/16 season, scoring nine goals as Rennes compiled a top half Ligue 1 finish, and was amongst the goals again in the early part of the 2016/17 season ahead of his move to Hull City. In three years in France Grosicki scored fifteen goals in 92 appearances for Stade Rennais.

In January 2020 Kamil left Hull City and joined Championship side West Bromwich Albion, he made 14 appearances for the Baggies (ten as sub) and scored one goal, inevitably in a July 2020 victory over Hull City. West Brom were promoted at the end of the elongated 2019/20 season and his game time during the 2020/21 Premier League campaign was limited to five appearances, mostly in the early weeks of Sam Allardyce’s managerial tenure. He left The Hawthorns in May 2021 at the end of his contract having scored one goal in 19 appearances.

After a restful summer Grosicki returned to Poland in August 2021, re-signing for his hometown club Pogon Szczecin. He made his first appearance in his second spell against Lech Poznan in August 2021 and scored his first goal in October 2021 against his former side Jagiellonia Bialystok. Kamil was playing regular first team football and scoring regularly once more as his side challenged at the top of the Ekstraklasa table, ending the season in third place and qualifying for the Europa Conference League. After finishing fourth in the 2022/23 season and again qualifying for Europe, Grosicki was made Szczecin’s first team captain at the start of the 2023/24 season and continued to thrive into his late thirties, reaching the May 2024 Polish Cup final that was lost to Wisla Krakow and netting sixteen times in all competitions, the best return of his career. In May 2025 Szczecin again reached the Polish Cup final, losing a seven goal thriller to Legia Warsaw. Kamil remained a part of the Pogon first eleven during the 2025/26 season as he approached his 38th birthday – by May 2026 Grosicki had added 55 goals in his second spell at Pogon Szczecin in 182 appearances.

Grosicki was involved with the Poland international setup as he came to prominence at Pogon Szczecin. He scored one goal in 7 appearances for Poland Under-18s during the 2005/06 season then made his debut for Poland’s Under-21 side against Spain in October 2007. He scored his first Under-21s goal in September 2009 against Finland, he made the last of his 11 Under-21 appearances and scored the last of his two goals against Albania in May 2010.

In February 2008 Kamil won his first senior international cap for Poland. He made occasional appearances over the next two and a half years, from June 2010 he was a regular part of the Poland senior squad. He made one appearance against Czechia in the Euro 2012 finals hosted in Poland, but it wasn’t until September 2014 that he scored his first goals for his country with a brace against Gibraltar. He scored six goals during the 2015/16 season and played in all five of Poland’s matches during the Euro 2016 finals played in France. Between September 2017 and November 2019 Grosicki made 25 appearances and scored four goals for Poland while a Hull City player, which included three appearances in the 2018 World Cup finals played in Russia. In October 2020 Kamil captained his country for the second time and scored a hattrick in a friendly against Finland.

Grosicki was not selected by Poland for most of the 2021/22 season following his return to Pogon Szczecin, but he was recalled in March 202s and was selected for Poland’s 2022 World Cup squad in Qatar, making one appearance as a late substitute against France. He was also selected for the Poland squad that competed at the Euro 2024 finals played in Germany but made just one appearance against Austria before announcing his international retirement. In June 2025 he was given a guard of honour and made captain in a friendly against Moldova, an occasion that prompted Kamil to make himself available for selection once again. In November 2025 he won his 100th senior international cap against Malta, then in March 2026 he won his last cap for his country against Sweden – in eighteen years as a senior international Grosicki scored seventeen goals in 101 appearances.

Details

Nationality: Poland
Date/Place of Birth: 8 June 1988, Szczecin (Poland)
Hull City First Game: 4 February 2017, Liverpool H (Premier League), 28 years, 241 days old
Hull City Final Game: 28 January 2020, Huddersfield Town H (Championship), 31 years, 234 days old

Clubs

Pogon Szczecin (2004-2007), Legia Warsaw (2007-2009), Sion (2008, loan), Jagiellonia Bialystok (2009, loan), Jagiellonia Bialystok (2009-2011), Sivasspor (2011-2014), Stade Rennais (2014-17), Hull City (2017-2020), West Bromwich Albion (2020-2021), Pogon Szczecin (2021-current)

Hull City Record

Career: 123 apps, 25 goals