Arvids Jurgens

Arvids Jurgens
Position	Right Wing
Teams	Wanderer Riga ASK Riga
National team	Latvia
Born	May 27, 1905, Riga, Russian Empire
Died	December 17, 1955, Montreal, QC, CAN
Playing Career	1927 – 1937

Arvids Jurgens (May 27, 1905 - December 17, 1955) was a Latvian hockey player. He played for the Latvian National Team at four major international tournaments. Jurgens played club hockey for Wanderer Riga and ASK Riga.

Jurgens began playing football with JKS Riga in 1921, in 1922 winning silver medals of Riga championship with the club, although he was mainly the second choice goalkeeper behind Hermanis Saltups. When in 1923 RFK was formed, Jurgens alongside most of the JKS footballers joined the new club which proved to be the flagman of Latvian football in the years to come.

From 1924 to 1926 Jurgens won three Latvian league titles with RFK and became a two-time winner of the Riga Football Cup. From 1924 he also played for Latvia national football team for which in the years to come he played nearly two times as many matches as his main competitor Harijs Lazdiņš from Olimpija Liepāja. He was a member of the Latvian football team at the 1924 Summer Olympics.

In 1927 Jurgens became the instigator for Riga Vanderer being formed as there was an incident involving Jurgens playing for different clubs in different sports which eventually led to Jurgens being arrested before a bandy match. He joined the newly founded Vanderer (alongside several other former RFK footballers) and together with the side rose to the Latvian Higher League over just two years. For the 1928/1929 season Jurgens left Latvia and played with Austria Wien becoming the first Latvian footballer to play abroad. Before the 1932 season Jurgens left Vanderer for ASK Riga with which he won his fourth Latvian championship in 1932. He played with ASK until the 1937/38 season after which he switched solely to refereeing eventually becoming one of the best football referees in Latvia. With Latvia national football team he played his last match in 1935. Jurgens continued to perform as a football referee after World War II when he lived in Germany and Canada.

He was also a basketball player. Jurgens won the Latvian basketball league title when playing with RFK in 1925.

Statistics

	Years	#	GP	Goals	Assists	Pts
Olympic Games	1936	1	3	0	0	0
European Championships	1932	1	4	1	0	1
World Championships	1933-1935	2	9	2	0	2

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