Austria’s record goalscorer Toni Polster (59) is still on the mend after an emergency operation for a perforated stomach. The aim is to start training again with SC Wiener Viktoria on January 15th, said the former Bundesliga professional at a media event.
Polster has been coaching the club from the East Regional Football League since 2011, with the exception of a short-term engagement at FC Admira Wacker Mödling. The president of the club is the former Frankfurt professional Martin Hinteregger.
Polster suffered a perforated stomach on December 28th on the way to a press conference and had to undergo emergency surgery. “The doctors told me that if I had stayed at home that night, it would have been fatal if I hadn’t survived the night,” said Polster now. He wants to pay more attention to himself in the future: “I have to live healthier. I have to write that down in my family book.”
The operation took three hours, said the former Gladbach and Cologne striker. “Thank God my wife pushed so hard that we went to the hospital.”
He was shocked when doctors said he needed emergency surgery “with a hole in his stomach.” At the end of November he had already had hip surgery.
Polster once played for 1. FC Köln in the Bundesliga for five years from the summer of 1993 and then for two seasons at Borussia Mönchengladbach. With 44 goals, Polster is the Austrian national team’s record goalscorer.
He is currently fighting for the retrospective recognition of three goals in his international career. The goals were scored in games that were previously considered unofficial. It has been bothering him “for decades that these games, these three goals don’t count,” he confirmed on Wednesday.