A German woman who was held up and robbed in her Berlin apartment earlier this month was astonished to see the thief waiting to board her flight from Antalya in Turkey to the German capital, police said on Tuesday. The 37-year-old woman telephoned her husband who alerted the authorities, police spokesperson Joerg Kunzendorf said.
Borussia Dortmund’s South African striker Delron Buckley is moving to Swiss club Basel on a season-long loan deal, the German side announced on Tuesday. Buckley joined Dortmund last year after scoring 15 league goals for Arminia Bielefeld in the 2004/05 season but he failed to find the net even once in the Bundesliga last term.
Germany is honouring Bertolt Brecht with fanfare on the 50th anniversary of his death, hinting that the country is ready at last to embrace the playwright and poet as a national hero and forgive him for going to his grave a communist. There is no ignoring Brecht as theatres from Berlin to Bonn to Hanover dust off his plays.
Work on three of South Africa’s new stadiums for the 2010 soccer World Cup can be completed in three years, though such a tight timetable would not have been feasible in bureaucratic Germany, says a German architect involved in the project. ”By 1999, we were already planning for the Olympic Stadium. That’s seven years before the event took place,” he told journalists in Berlin.
German cyclist Jan Ullrich was supplied with a potent cocktail of performance-enhancing drugs by the Spanish doctor accused of running a doping ring that has left the sport in crisis, it was reported in Germany on Saturday. The allegations were made by anti-doping campaigner Werner Franke in a newspaper interview.
Manchester United’s Dutch striker Ruud van Nistelrooy wants to play for Bayern Munich next season according to Bild newspaper, though Spanish press claim he will join Real Madrid. Bayern club president Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, quoted by Thursday’s Bild, said the offer was for â,¬13-million.
The top World Cup official in Berlin has died four days after shooting himself in the head just hours after the final, the German press reported on Friday. The <i>Berliner Morgenpost</i> quoted a spokesperson of the Charite hospital as saying Juergen Kiessling (65) passed away on Thursday.
As the charismatic, 41-year-old Jurgen Klinsmann on Wednesday stunned about 82-million Germans by declaring he was stepping down as national soccer coach after a tenure of two years, South African observers in Germany gathering ideas for the hosting of the 2010 World Cup were echoing the sentiment: ”Where can Bafana find another Klinsmann?”
It is designed as an ongoing, sometimes routine meeting between President Thabo Mbeki and his team of advisers on the one hand, and the captains of South African industry on the other. But when all the camaraderie is completed at Wednesday’s get-together, Mamelodi Sundowns president Patrice Motsepe intends to exhort big businesses to support South African soccer to the hilt.
German champions Bayern Munich on Monday confirmed they want to sign Manchester United striker Ruud van Nistelrooy. Dutch star Van Nistelrooy (30) looks certain to leave Old Trafford this summer after falling out with United manager Sir Alex Ferguson at the end of last season.
A day after the World Cup ended, host nation Germany was not only counting the immediate economic benefits for businesses during the month-long mega-event, but also was hoping that the party mood will continue for the eurozone’s biggest economy in the much longer term.
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France captain Zinedine Zidane, sent off for headbutting Marco Materazzi late in Sunday’s World Cup final loss to Italy, won the Golden Ball award for the tournament’s best player. The results were released on Monday morning in Berlin by Fifa.
<a href="http://www.mg.co.za/specialreport.aspx?area=soccer_world_cup_2006"><img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/272488/icon_focuson_wc3.gif" align=left border=0></a>France captain Zinedine Zidane, sent off for headbutting Marco Materazzi late in Sunday’s World Cup final loss to Italy, won the Golden Ball award for the tournament’s best player. The results were released on Monday morning in Berlin by Fifa.
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To the very end of his career, Zinedine Zidane could dictate the flow of play with rare skill and elegant control of the ball. In the World Cup final, Zidane lost control of his temper. The parting image for the France captain will forever be him rearing back in anger, lowering his head and launching his bald crown into the chest of Italy defender Marco Materazzi after the two exchanged words.
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One person was conspicuous by his absence from the podium when Italy’s players received their winners’ medals and German President Horst Koehler handed their captain Fabio Cannavaro the World Cup. The president of football’s world controlling body Fifa Joseph Blatter was not amongst the host of dignitaries present at the award ceremony after the 5-3 penalty shoot-out win over France.
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Italy won the World Cup in a penalty shoot-out, beating France 5-3 on Sunday after a 1-1 draw through 120 minutes. David Trezeguet hit the crossbar with France’s second spot kick to give Italy its fourth World Cup title, and Fabio Grosso made the deciding kick. ”It’s incredibly emotional, words cannot hardly describe it,” Grosso said after the final whistle.
A Kenyan team on Saturday won the first street football world championship, beating South Africa 4-3 in a penalty shoot-out. Twenty-two teams of youngsters from poor backgrounds had taken part in the week-long tournament in Berlin, focusing attention on the game’s gritty origins and its power to fight social ills.
Visiting South African President Thabo Mbeki has been supportive of European Union plans to send up to 2Â 000 soldiers to the Democratic Republic of Congo before and after free elections, according to German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday.
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The first World Cup to be hosted in Africa will provide an unparalleled business opportunity in four years time, organisers of South Africa 2010 said in Berlin at a presentation of their wares. Up to five million tourists are expected to flood into South Africa for the month-long jamboree, and the government has committed a R375-billion development package to the project.
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Germany’s Lukas Podolski was named by Fifa on Friday as the World Cup’s best young player. The 21-year-old Polish-born striker scored three goals after coach Jurgen Klinsmann had selected him as part of a drive to reinvigorate a flagging team. He has now scored 15 goals in 31 appearances with the national team.
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Germany striker Miroslav Klose says he is desperate to win the Golden Boot title after missing out on Sunday’s World Cup final in Berlin. Klose leads the scoring charts with five goals and has the chance to put more distance between him and his rivals when hosts Germany take on Portugal in Saturday’s third-place play-off in Stuttgart.
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Even as this World Cup reaches a climax with Italy having booked a final spot against France or Portugal on Sunday, eyes are already turning to a South African jamboree in four years’ time. Organisers are hoping the first World Cup to be played on African soil will produce ”Football for a Better World” and Fifa will flag up preparations on Friday at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate.
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Police at Berlin’s fan festival have been testing a new device designed to detect chemical and biological threats — giving it a dress rehearsal for the World Cup final. The 70kg portable device, named Sigis 2, can detect 200 different chemical compounds from a distance of 5km.
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Football’s world governing body will help South Africa organise the 2010 World Cup but believes the country is more than capable of staging the event, Fifa president Sepp Blatter said on Tuesday. ”South Africa is a multi-cultural country of different tribes … and you do need a certain kind of intelligence to bring this all together,” Blatter said.
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Germany go up against Italy in Dortmund with a slot in the World Cup final at stake on Tuesday, while France and Portugal head for Munich and their clash on Wednesday in the second semifinal. German hopes of reaching a second successive final were dealt a body blow late on Monday with the news that midfield dynamo Torsten Frings would miss the game after being suspended.
One of the Brazil’s top stars, defender Roberto Carlos, has announced he is retiring from international football following his country’s World Cup quarterfinal defeat against France. ”My days playing with the national side are over,” the Real Madrid wing-back said on his personal website.
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The World Cup is soccer’s greatest spectacle. It’s also a month-long grind, and the fatigue is starting to show. Games every few days, many played under a summer sun. Travel back and forth across Germany. Pressure that grows with every game. And that’s on top of the nine months that many players just spent with soccer’s best clubs.
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Germany midfielder Torsten Frings has been suspended for Tuesday’s World Cup semifinal against Italy, world soccer governing body Fifa said on Monday. Frings was barred after the Fifa disciplinary committee viewed TV pictures, which show him hitting an Argentinian player in the face.
Just as national economies move in cycles so does football — and the current World Cup downturn is proving a long slog for Argentina, who with their quarterfinal loss to Germany must now be classed among the latter day underachievers.
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Germany could be hit by a late blow ahead of Tuesday’s World Cup semifinal with Italy after Fifa announced they would take a decision whether to punish influential midfielder Torsten Frings. Fifa took the decision on Sunday after viewing television footage in which he apparently hits Argentinian striker Julio Cruz after the quarterfinal.
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Argentina coach Jose Pekerman announced he was standing down from the post shortly after the penalties loss to Germany in the World Cup quarterfinals on Friday. The 56-year-old former youth-team coach was promoted to the senior national side two years ago, replacing Marcelo Bielsa, who was in charge of Argentina at the last World Cup.
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Goalkeeper Jens Lehmann was the toast of Germany as the hosts progressed into the semifinals of the World Cup with a sensational 4-2 penalty shootout win over Argentina on Friday. With the game unsettled at 1-1 after extra-time, Arsenal goalkeeper Lehmann stepped up to save spot-kicks from Roberto Ayala and Esteban Cambiasso to ensure celebration parties across Germany.