In his Home Village Pecka is as Famous as Cardinal Vlk
About ten kilometers from the South Bohemian town of Prachatice lies the village of Lažiště. Here you can see the Church of St. Nicolas in which Cardinal Vlk used to celebrate mass. This village's soccer field witnessed the early days of Luboš Pecka, currently with seven goals the best player and the most precisely shooting forward for FK Mladá Boleslav. Cardinal Vlk and the soccer player Pecka are the most famous figures in the history of Lažiště. At least the local annals say so. "I am entered as the first Lažiště man who ever played in the premier soccer league," admits Luboš Pecka with a smile.
What would a village be without a pub? Its name is Na návsi and whenever the soccer king pays a visit home once every three or four weeks he has a beer in the pub and chats with friends. They talk about local soccer issues, as well as about Pecka's issues.
Most of his eighteen goals in the league are recorded and stored in Luboš Pecka's private collection. Sometimes he watches them and thinks about how to improve. "My best goal was the winning goal against Olomouc when we won 2:1 at our home ground. The most important one was probably against Sparta when we beat them here in Mladá Boleslav."
Most of the local matches are attended by the whole Pecka family - his wife and daughter, both named Alena. Luboš met his wife Alena at a disco and he likes to say that after the time they have spent together, Alena has acquired some knowledge of soccer. Recently, however, he keeps getting warnings from his wife to be more cautious. The media frequently show the consequences of extraordinarily rough play, with players sometimes ending up in hospital. "Understandably, she is afraid that I'll get hurt, but I do not intend to change the way I play," comments Pecka firmly. He considers the serious soccer injuries frequently shown in the media to be a combination of various circumstances. "Recently, the injuries have been numerous, but I do not think that the brutality on soccer fields has increased dramatically." And have opponents started committing more fouls against him now that he is the league's best scorer? "I don't see the defenders going for me any more than before," says Pecka.
