Into the war zone

Our policy for this trip, though, was simple. Even though so many things in this great country can’t help but remind of the terrible conflicts, we will keep the whole business firmly beneath our hats. Don’t m the w.

This might, we feared, prove difficult in Nuremberg, given that the stadium for England’s match against Trinidad & Tobago is overlooked by the monumental stone edifice from which Hitler exhorted the nation to unleash Sturm und Drang on the rest of the world. We needn’t have been so coy. The modern Germans, it seems, have no such inhibitions.

As we roll into town, the first thing we see is a poster for a big exhibition in the local museum, “What Is German?” (Was Ist Deutsch?); beneath that stark question is a picture. Not of a sausage or a foaming stein of lager or an indestructible automobile. No, the pictorial answer to the question is, startlingly, one of those First World War helmets, complete with double-headed eagle crest and impaling-spike.

Equally strange is an item that pops up on a TV discussion show. Without warning, we suddenly cut to the halfway line of a football pitch, where two stout fellows are gleefully bolting together the final parts of what looks unnervingly like a 1916-vintage howitzer. Once finished, they load the thing with footballs which are fired — with Frank Lampard-style inaccuracy — at the distant goal. Everyone knows the legend of the gunfire on the Western Front being interrupted for a game of football; here the whole process has been reversed.

But the most blatant breaching of the Don’t Mention The War protocol occurs in the very first prolonged conversation we have with a real-life German. Klaus is a chap of medium years with a fine command of English. We get talking about the match between the hosts and their neighbours, Poland.

Given that Germany’s forwards, Miroslav Klose and Lucas Podolski, are of Polish extraction, I playfully suggest that Poland v Germany might more usefully be called Poland v Poland. It is, at best, a weak joke, but it causes Klaus to convulse with laughter. “Oh yeah!” he screeches. “I see it! Poland . . . versus Poland!” Then, tears still coursing down his face, he adds: “And maybe after the match we can take back Poland . . . again!” It is our rush to get away from Klaus that causes us to board the first train we see. Next stop . . . Wiesbaden.

To absent talents - whoever and wherever they may be

THE LONG TRAIN JOURNEYS AND interminable bouts of post-match sausage-eating leave plenty of time for musing on critical questions. Foremost among these in the past few days has been: who is 2006’s George Best? You know the drill. Every World Cup throws together the best players on the planet. Inevitably, though, through an accident of birth, a few of the game’s most phosphorescent talents miss the party; their country simply doesn’t qualify. Then, like a favourite cousin who, because of the cost of flights from Australia “this time of year”, misses a wedding, their absence is endlessly rehearsed and drunkenly bemoaned.

Historically, this has been known as The George Best Problem. In more recent times, The Ryan Giggs Conundrum.

But this time round something very odd has happened. For whatever reason — heated balls at the draw, Far East betting syndicates, global warming — most of the world’s great footballing powers have made it to Germany and with them the vast majority of the best footballers. So, when Dan, between mouthfuls of Wurst and Radler (the local shandy), idly inquires of me “who’s the best player not at the tournament”? I lean confidently towards him with the delighted smugness of a man given an opportunity to illustrate the depth of a bosom chum’s ignorance.

In the event, though, such hubris proves illusory. Our eyes meet, my mouth opens, but, weirdly, no roll call of absent greats is forthcoming. Even an ever-more desperate scanning of the horizons of my footballing knowledge proves fruitless. The (pathetic) best I can do is: “Erm, probably Ryan Giggs.”

Can that be right? The best player not adorning the present festivities is Manchester United’s ageing winger? Incredibly, it probably is. Further scraping of the bottom of the Panini barrel throws up the names of Eidur Gudjonnsen, Julius Aghahowa, Nigeria’s flick-flack specialist, and Dimitar Berbatov, the playboy Bulgarian for whom Spurs have just paid through the nose. Is that it? Hardly names to set the senses spinning, are they? Hardly names to get the TV companies screaming at Fifa to pinpoint a loophole that would allow this battalion of missing genius back-door entrance to the main event.

Indeed, even with the addition of much more Radler, and a few bottles of Becks’ slurplicious new lemon and lime flavoured beer (“we’ll never export it to Britain; it’s much too good”), we are unable to cobble together a team of absent friends who might seriously cause disquiet among Costa Rica or Paraguay, never mind the strutting likes of Italy or Argentina.

In times of such difficulty, Danny and I have a plan: make the readers/listeners do the work. There will be a prize (as yet undiscussed with the purse-keepers at The Times) for the best answer. Can you construct an XI from players not at this year’s World Cup who could beat Brentford, much less Brazil? Answers, please (headed You Forgot Muzzy Izzet, You Lazy Scheisters) to the usual e-mail address.

Back at the big show, and in keeping with the template set by Danny in his previous missive, I will end with a list of the most extraordinary things that we’ve experienced in what is an ongoing assault on the senses. Among the very best stuff to pass our way is . . .

The sight of Jens Lehmann, giving it plenty of David Beckham on the cover of German GQ; he looks almost normal, proof positive that with enough hairbrush and airbrush even a dog’s dinner can be turned into the cat’s pyjamas.

The early morning football debrief on the breakfast TV show. The tactical analysis is done in a little stadium made of Lego; all the players are suitably kitted out Lego men. Best of all, when the Identikit football coach wants to highlight one of the players, he stands them on a beer mat! Giving money in a Nuremberg street to a band composed of actual Cheyenne Indians. Seeing the Trinidad carnival recreated — kaleidoscopic costumes, steel drums, stilt-walkers and all.

Discovering a new word, uttered by 75 per cent of all England fans you meet: “Gotnee”. It is inevitably followed by the word “tickets?” Talking to English coppers brought over here to help with the policing; one we spoke to would rather have been at home (“My beat is Stoke and Port Vale . . . I hate football.”) The 40ft glass of ice-cold lager a man cuddles up to in a popular advert. The formerly proud, now forlorn, employees of the Deutsch Bundesbahn, the German railway system, forced to give out information from inside giant footballs. Mexico fans in sombreros the size of card tables. The incredibly operatic version of the old terrace chant, “Stand Up For The Champions . . .” They play at the end of every match; imagine the Three Tenors, in full sail, belting out “You’re Not Singing Any More.”

All of which might lead you to believe that everyone is joining in the party atmosphere. Don’t be fooled. After Germany’s lucky, single-goal victory against Poland, the streets were suddenly filled with hundreds of BMWs, Audis, Mercs and Volkswagens, their young passengers filling the night air with triumphant whoops, hollers and loudly beeped car horns.

Our taxi — driven by a septuagenarian possessed of distinctly Meldrewian bent and, as far as we knew, no English — was caught up in this cacophonous mayhem. Emboldened, perhaps, by Radler and lime-flavoured beer, I pointed at our transport’s horn, suggesting that our crusty cabbie might like to add to the tumult.

Without as much as a sideways glance, and in the most fabulous Sergeant Schultz accent imaginable, he proffered his opinion of the night’s events: “All ziss shid fur one fugging goal!” And so, “To Cologne!” Via Wiesbaden, probably.

MONDAY: Danny Baker

What do you think?

EMAIL: dannyanddanny@hotmail.com