Even for the most avid supporter, a German cup quarter-final between Hertha Berlin and Borussia Monchengladbach does not instantly compute as a ‘must-see’ game. Certainly not if it involves sitting in minus ten degree cold.
So why do it? Simple really: a visit to the Olympic Stadium was too good an opportunity to pass up.
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We arrived at our apartment at18:30. The improbability of making a 19:00 kick-off in an unfamiliar city considering the likelihood of being fleeced by touts, rendered my mind hopeful and skeptical in equal measure as the U-bahn hurtled towards the stadium.
Outside we walked quickly, burdened with the apprehension that accompanies what the French call depaysement, and the dread with which you anticipate a long, cold night.
My mind’s unease alerted me to the unsettling history of the structure before me. The glitz of the new stadium did nothing to mask its dark past.
Having scalped two tickets – a reasonable 20 Euros each – and found our seats with the sort of fuss-free efficiency that typifies Germany, the cold, hard truth of the stadium sank in.
My eyes darted between the cinematic green splendour and the elliptical, enveloping 74,000-capacity seating, drawn inevitably to one end of the great oval where the Olympic torch sat in 1936. Taken aback, I gazed directly in front to an incongruous section of seating, where I guessed Hitler had sat.
Encapsulated by the synaesthetic blur of my surroundings, the clarity of consciousness caused by the sight of these Nazi relics was harrowing.
In a BBC interview 2004, the sports psychologist Gunter Gebauer summed up the initial impression of the Olympic Stadium perfectly. He said: “The history is there, the totality of the buildings is there [:] the whole Nazi landscape has not disappeared”.
And so football was at the back of my mind for some time – not least because the miserable spectacle on the pitch offered little distraction.
Bar the occasional half-chance or corner, nothing happened during normal time, though the noise of the 47,465 attendance was deafening throughout. Both sets of fans were fantastic, almost intimidatingly fervent. Amidst the flag-waving, toilet paper-throwing and unified clapping, I sensed passion free of the cynicism which infects English terraces.
As a dreary quarter-final ended, the beckoning of extra-time seemed like torture to my frozen toes but nonetheless, the litre of beer in my stomach worked wonders on the cockles of my heart.
A physical confrontation between Hertha’s Roman Hubnik and Monchengladbach’s Igor De Camargo enlivened proceedings, though ironically killed the game off as Hubnik’s red card and Filip Daems’ converted penalty settled the tie.
A wretched Adrian Ramos miss was the only decent chance for the hosts who had long given up before Oscar Wendt added insult to injury with Monchengladbach’s second.
As I walked away, turning my back on those two towers as so many Germans have tried to since, I realised that such was the resonance of this powerful building, that it was now a part of my own personal history as well as theirs.
By Chris Smith
chrissmithfootballblog 