Fußball 101: Stadium Scran
Don’t give me any of that posh muck. Eine bratwurst bitte.
Twenty minutes until kickoff. Your stomach’s rumbling.
Once again, you’ve decided on skipping a well rounded meal to squeeze in an extra beer or two with the lads.
You’re through the turnstiles now, but you’ve got a decision to make. Do you find a better spot on the quickly filling terraces, or do you make a detour to a food vendor?
At most German stadiums, you’ve got three or four simple options. Option 1: You can scarf down a pretzel. Not a bad choice, but seeing as you’ve already been on the liquid bread for the past two hours, it might feel like you’re developing a real-time intolerance to gluten.
Option 2: a wurst of some description. Depending on where you are in the country this could be a white sausage, a krakauer, something resembling your typical frankfurter or maybe just a run-of-the-mill snag. Again, this is coming in a bun. You cannot outrun the carbs.
Option 3: a local delicacy of some kind. Up north, you’ll get a fishbröchten, a bit of fish in — you guessed it! — a bread roll. At the Allianz, you can tuck into some kästespatzle, an egg-noodle dish covered in lashings of cheese sauce.
Option 4: pommes. Because who doesn’t bloody love some chips? ‘Ketchup mayo’? The fella working the stall asks. Yes please boss, paint the tray ‘rot-weiss’.
This is all to say: German football hasn’t fallen victim to the trappings of what I’m calling ‘Big Scran’. The growth of social media has precipitated a gourmand movement through the sports stadiums of North America and the UK. At Tottenham Hotspur for example, you can tuck into a variety of different cuisines, adding to the feeling of being in the Westfield food court rather than a football stadium. Loaded fries, onion bhaji burgers, tandoori chicken, gourmet this and that. All sounds lovely. But it seems the German people want cheap, traditional fare in their stadiums, and I happen to agree with them.
A comprehensive ranking of the wursts I’ve eaten in German football stadiums
I’m trying something a little different with this piece. Once I hit publish, most of the articles you see in your inbox stay untouched. Yes, I edit the odd spelling mistake or grammatical snafu here and there, but there’s no point crying over spilled milk.
This piece will be routinely updated as I travel across the country. I will endeavour to rank the snags I’ve wolfed down in every football stadium I visit, producing — as far as I know — the only comprehensive and exhaustive list of the best wursts German football has to offer.
Grünwalder Straße — 1860 Munich
A krakauer style glizzy. Nicely spiced. As per, the bun to sausage ratio is a bit off, but the flavour experience made up for it. 8.2/10
Merkur-Spiel Arena — Fortuna Düsseldorf
Another krakuer? I think I’m sensing a theme here. A more fastidious scientist would ensure uniformity, opting for your bargain bratwurst to maintain integrity in their experiment. I never did care for the sciences at school. What I do care for? Big meaty sausages that deliver in spicing. An outstanding banger. 8.1/10
NB They had those sauce dispensers that look like udders at the Merkur-Spiel. I find them deeply, deeply off putting.
Volkswagen Arena — VfL Wolfsburg
This was a bit cold if memory serves, but the mercury was turning solid that day. Maybe I’m over-estimating this meat tube as I needed something, anything, to warm me up. If I remember correctly, it was pretty herby and the curry ketchup was banging. 7.9/10
Signal Iduna Park — Borussia Dortmund
Just completely forgetful. I didn’t have to pay for it though, so swings and roundabouts. 6.8/10
Olympiastadion — Hertha Berlin
Not gonna lie, I was blitzed by the time I put this in my craw. It was during the Euros so UEFA had jacked up the prices. I simply resent having to pay €7 for a middling sausage. 5.3/10
Allianz Arena — Bayern Munich
Tasted of nothing. Again, this was during the NFL International Series so maybe this isn’t their usual offering. 4.3/10
Stadiums I have visited but haven’t tried their wurst: Ostseestadion — Hansa Rostock; Stadion an der Alte Fösterei — Union Berlin (this seems a strange oversight, I think I’ve only ever had the pork chop in a bun, top scran); Veltins Arena — Schalke
Wörterbuch-Ecke — German football phrases you need to know
Sprichwort: Notbremse
Direct translation: Emergency brake
Spiritual translation: Professional foul
Football obsessed gamers in their early thirties will probably remember the short-lived run of This is Football. The series acted as the third party in FIFA and Pro Evo’s duopoly on the soccer simulation market. To differentiate itself, the game allowed players to unleash a deliberate red-card challenge on opponents. To a 13 year-old boy, this was unbelievably funny. I can vividly remember being round my mate Matt’s house, taking it in turns to dropkick each other’s players in the shins, resulting in so many red cards that the game had to be forfeited.
The above clip looks eerily similar to those instances of computer-generated grievous bodily harm we metered out on Matt’s PS2. Factor in the empty stands, the clear run to goal for the Hoffenheim striker and the flailing chase of Kevin Casteels, this blatant professional foul by Paolo Otavio is an all-time Bundesliga clip for me.
I’ve never seen something so cynical. It’s probably worth a bit of pearl clutching and preaching but I’m safe in the knowledge that I am a degenerate. More of this please.
One last thing before you head off. You can read my first piece for Mundial’s new digital offering here. It’s an interview with Ina Franzmann, the designer of West Germany’s kit from Italia 90. As the masthead says, it’s a stone cold classic.
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