It’s something he shares with most of the Polish squad eyeing Emerging Nations World Cup glory this week, including brother Michael and Dapto Canaries star Harry Siejka.

Maslanka’s grandparents emigrated to Australia from their Nazi-occupied homeland after World War II, a story shared by most members of the squad. 

The Jamberoo star said it’s something that’s certainly bonded them together ahead of the tournament.

“Playing for Poland was not something I expected to do but it’s come up and I’m really proud to have done it now,” Maslanka said.

“My Polish heritage comes from my dad’s side of the family, both my grandparents are Polish. They came over after the war for a new life and I’ve found lot of the boys grandparents have similar stories. 

“I’ve always know about my heritage through my grandmother but I haven’t really been around it too much. Being in this team and being around all the boys that have that same background has really opened me up to it a lot more. 

“After learning more about that heritage and talking to the other boys about their families and how their stories relate to my family’s it makes me really proud for us to represent our grandparents, our parents and our heritage.” 

Poland opened their campaign with a 62-6 win over Hong Kong on Thursday, putting a top-two finish – and a finals berth –  in Pool C within reach, though they’ll need a big win over Japan on Sunday to edge out either Turkey or Solomon Islands.

“It was good first hit-out for the competition,” Maslanka said of the first-up win.

“We all seemed to gel pretty well together in that first half. We slackened up a little bit in the second half and started a little bit sluggish but we got a roll on again and put a few on them which was good.

“We’re all pretty new, we only trained as a whole squad for the first time last weekend so we’ve only had the one weekend camp together.

“We had a trial against Hungary last week without our full squad there but we won pretty convincingly in the end. After [Thursday’s] result and the result on Friday we’re looking pretty strong. 

“I haven’t seen too much of the other games but at the moment we’re all pretty confident in our ability and that we can go pretty deep into the tournament.” 

Mt Kembla’s Nathan Mikalowski, Warilla-Lake South’s Tynan Forster and Kiama’s Mark Chmurycz are also part of the Poland squad. 

Related content: Maslanka brothers shine as Poland thump Hong Kong