Jendrisak: Rookie with a Routine

The status of the Swedish SSL is known – the best league with the best players in the world. Also the status of Mika Kohonen is known – this Finnish pass-magician and natural leader was part of the successes of the swedish clubs Balrog and Storvreta as well as the two World Champion titles of the finnish national team. In the season 2000/01 he was as the first foreign player ever elected to be the SSL-rookie of the year...

Since then the long 14 years had to pass, in which players like Mattias Samuelsson, Kim Nilsson or Alexander Rudd were awarded, before another foreign player got the same honor. In 2014/15, representing Linköping, the czech forward Matej Jendrisak was picked to be the best. To know if his career will be as shiny and successful as the one of Kohonen, we will have to wait for another at least ten years. But that he is well under way, is quite clear already now. After the season 2015/16 he has been put on the TOP 10 list worldwide (announced by Innebandymagazinet).

_{Pavel Kozusnik (left) meant a lot for Matej Jendrisak. (Photo Damian Keller)}

Mentor Pavel Kozusnik
Matej Jendrisak was born 1989 in Havirov, a town with 80’000 inhabitants, just 11 km from Ostrava. He got his first taste of floorball as a school sport, when he was 10 years old. One year later he became a member of the Havirov club, even though it was not very easy. “I was kind of old already, but I really wanted to do some sports on a competitive level, be a member of a team. Hockey was the sport nr. 1 when hanging with others outside, we always played with sticks and a tennis ball. So when I discovered floorball, I had to beg my parents on my knees so they would let me join the club,” smiles Jendrisak. 

So the Czech and actually even the worldwide floorball should thank Jendrisak for his obstinacy, which made him become a floorball player in the first place. Actually, obstinacy is one of his strongest sides until today. He hates to lose and he doesn’t like giving up. And his talent was undoubted since the very beginning. The Havirov A-team coach Ivo Jochman had spotted it and picked Jendrisak as a member of the Extraliga team already when he was 16 years young (2005/2006) and gave him space to grow. In the forward line with the experienced superstar of the Czech national team Pavel Kozusnik, Jendrisak became a solid member of the roster already during his second season. He helped Havirov to reach the historical success of winning silver in the league. Pavel Kozusnik gets a lot of words of gratefulness from Jendrisak: “He had just come back from Switzerland, as a big star, but he actually was and still is just a normal and ordinary guy, in the best meaning of the words, who never pretended to be something else. I was really impressed!”

_{Matej Jendrisak as a Czech player of the Year (2015) tohether with his girlfriend Radka Topicova, who is playing for Linköping as well. (Photo Cesky florbal)}

Chodov´s Record Machine
Even being a real floorball enthusiast, Jendrisak knew very well, that life is not sport only. Before the season 2008/2009 he moved to Prague to study economy and the sovereign of the Czech floorball, Tatran Stresovice, got a new team member. He was quite successful, but not very happy with the position and role he played. He was used to having much more responsibility, which was not easy to get in a team full of Czech national team players. After just one season, he hopped over to the city rival TJ JM Chodov. ”I was not given as much space as I would have wished for. That´s why I wanted to leave. At the same time I wanted to find a team with as high ambitions as I have myself. That´s why I chose Chodov. And it seems to have been a good decision.” 

Yes, it has! During the next five years representing Chodov, Jendrisak dominated all the club statistics, he was appointed the captain, became three times the player of the year, won four times the overall scoring list and set the record in productivity, collecting 73 points during 22 games in the season 2011/2012. It was clear that for such a player, sooner or later the Czech league will be too small. And when he added some successful performances in the national team to his club merits, it was no surprise that the SSL wanted to have him. 

_{Matej Jendrisak debuted in the senior national team at EFT 2009. (Photo Cesky florbal)}

National Teams UPs and DOWNs
The Swiss fans could see Jendrisak for the first time in autumn 2007 at the U19 WFC in Kirchberg and Zuchwil. During that tournament, the Czech team lost only against the Swedish well oiled machine, operated by guys like Nilsberth, Sundstedt, Malström or Stenberg. But Jendrisak showed his potential by scoring against them in the group game as well as in the final. Who could have known that a couple of years later he would be meeting them regularly as opponents in the SSL.

Jendrisak was invited to the senior national team for the first time in 2009, for the Euro Floorball Tour (EFT) in Brno. ”The atmosphere was great and I was just telling myself to be careful and not to screw up too many things,” looks Jendrisak back with a smile. He didn´t and already a year later he was ”raging” in the national team at the WFC in Helsinki, where he played center of the first line for Zalesny and Ostransky. The Czechs won the bronze medal and Jendrisak introduced himself fully to the international floorball scene.

As Helsinki 2010 was kind of a breakthrough, the tournament two years later in Switzerland was just a nightmare. ”WFC 2012, that’s the worst moments of my floorball career so far. First the loss against Latvia in the group and then the setback in the ranking games. Horrible!” But two years had passed quickly and at WFC 2014 in Gothenburg, Jendrisak as well as the whole team, was back in the saddle. Another bronze medal and an individual achievement – as the most productive player of the team at the tournament. At that time already belonging to a Swedish elite club.

_{Matej Jendrisak has played two SM Finals with Linköping, but he is still waiting for the victory. (Photo Damian Keller)}

Feel-good Linköping
”After quite many years in the Czech Extraliga I felt like a needed a change and to try my luck abroad seemed like the best option,” explains Jendrisak his withdrawal from Chodov. He went to Linköping, who has been interested in him for some time already. After the tests in the club as well as a dialogue with the team staff, he had decided that this was the place to stay. ”I really like living here. I have lived in Prague for a couple of years and I was really fed up with such a large city. Linköping is kind of small and cozy, everything is at hand. And I like the nature around here too – the woods, rivers and mainly lakes, those are the things that add some bonus points to the life.”

And as it seems, Linköping was a lucky choice for Jendrisak. During both seasons, he was the most scoring player of the team and made it twice to the SM-Finalen. He has not yet experienced the winning euphoria, but he is not giving up. “I want to stay in Sweden for a couple more years and fight hard to get the title. I also would like to play a WFC final!” And then? “Well, I would actually also want to play in Switzerland for a while,” throws Jendrisak the gauntlet to the local clubs. So who knows, maybe one day this talented forward unlike Mika Kohonen will play for one or another NLA team.


Interview with Matej Jendrisak to be read here.