Miroslav Stoch

Early career and Chelsea

Stoch's father realized his talent at an early age and placed him with his local club's academy Nitra. His hard work paid off as he was drafted into Nitra's first team after scoring a hat-trick in an under-17 match, at only 15 years old. Due to age restrictions in the Slovak First League, he could not play until his 16th birthday. He made his first-team debut at the age of 16 and by this time he was already being watched by European scouts. Chelsea had scouts in one of the international competitions he played in and offered him a trial around the same time that Nice was about to sign him. He duly impressed and was signed by Chelsea's youth academy in 2006. He was a regular for the under-18s in the 2006–07 season and scored 11 goals. He ended the season as top scorer for the under-18s even though he had always played on the wing. He started the 2007–08 season well and quickly progressed to the reserve team. Stoch himself stated that he was close to making his first-team debut and hoped to do so during the course of the 2007–08 season although he did not. Stoch finally made his first appearance as a substitute on 30 November 2008 against Arsenal at Stamford Bridge. He replaced Deco after 80 minutes. Chelsea lost the game 1–2. Stoch made his second appearance for the first-team, replacing Mikel John Obi in the 82nd minute of Chelsea's 2–1 comeback win over Stoke City, playing a major part in the lead-up to their second goal. Stoch again came on…

Stoch bases his game on his two footballing idols Ronaldinho and Ronaldo and tries to emulate them on the pitch.

Club

International

Scores and results list Slovakia's goal tally first, score column indicates score after each Stoch goal.

Stoch made his senior début for Slovakia on 10 February 2009 against Ukraine, where he came on in the 70th minute. His second appearance came just 24 hours later against Cyprus. He scored his first international goal for Slovakia against San Marino in a 2010 World Cup qualifier on 6 June 2009. Stoch was selected for the 2010 FIFA World Cup squad. On 7 September 2010, he scored the only goal of a Euro 2012 qualifying victory against Russia in Moscow. On 9 October 2014, Stoch scored the game-winning goal in the 2–1 UEFA Euro 2016 qualification win against title-holders Spain three minutes from time. Stoch became a part of a preliminary EURO 2016 squad and capped in a match against Germany, only days after death of his mother, due to which he had to be excused from a training camp in Austria in the previous week. During the final tournament Stoch only appeared against Wales, where he came on in the 83rd minute. During the flight from France Stoch had a conflict with national team coach Ján Kozák. In August 2016, Kozák said that he can not imagine his continuation of cooperation with Stoch and he has not been nominated until Kozák's resignation in October 2018. Stoch made his national team return in November 2018, when he was called up by its new coach Pavel Hapal for Nations League matches against Ukraine and Czech Republic.