Ideal 2006 preparation
ByReuters
Published 30/06/2005 at 12:39 GMT
FIFA officials were expressing their delight on Thursday after the Confederations Cup showed Germany's 2006 World Cup plans were on track. Franz Beckenbauer and his organising team seemed to spend most of the two-week, eight-team Confederations Cup apolog
Eurosport
Image credit: Eurosport
In truth there was nothing serious to detract from a tournament that featured moments of breathtaking football played out at five excellent stadiums in front of big crowds.
Even a violent storm that hit Frankfurt's Waldstadion could not dampen the atmosphere of the final, with fans thrilling to Brazil's 4-1 victory over Argentina as lightning flashed, thunder rumbled and rain poured through a hole in the roof.
The 2006 World Cup is four times the size of the Confederations Cup in terms of teams and matches, and will be staged at 12 venues, but organisers will be undaunted after a dry run that impressed FIFA president Sepp Blatter.
"We are looking confidently ahead at the World Cup," said Blatter after presiding over the last organising committee meeting.
"I have only positive things to report. The tournament has been a success in sporting and organisational terms. There has been an extraordinary atmosphere here in Germany."
The overwhelming positives for the organisers were the solid ticket sales for matches not involving Germany, the enthusiasm of the volunteers and the good condition of the five stadiums at Frankfurt, Leipzig, Hanover, Nuremberg and Cologne.
Over 575,000 tickets were sold for the 16 matches, which was around 85 percent of the total on offer and well above the original target figure of 420,000.
PUBLIC INTEREST
Twelve thousand fans turned up just to watch Brazil's first training session and the level of public interest remained high even after Germany's defeat by the world champions in the semi-final.
German police were also highly satisfied with the competition as a trial run for the World Cup.
"I'm very glad we had this dress rehearsal," said Heiko Loehr, head of the World Cup project team at the Bundeskriminalamt (BKA), Germany's federal police agency.
"The interplay with the other security agencies worked very well. That means that for the World Cup we can rely extensively on structures that have been tested."
The BKA said a mere 35 crimes had been recorded during the Confederations Cup, all of them minor, although the police acknowledge the World Cup, which will bring an estimated three million visitors to Germany, presents a challenge on a totally different scale.
The most serious problem at the Confederations Cup, and the biggest embarrassment for organisers, came from four separate incidents of fans evading stewards and being able to run on to the pitch.
"We have to find a way of stopping this," said Beckenbauer, the president of the Organising Committee.
"There will always be madmen all over the world, but I'm confident that our security experts will find a solution."
Vice-president Horst R. Schmidt also recognised problems in the chip-reading technology in the tickets being used in Frankfurt, while the retractable roof at the Waldstadion was clearly not up to the stormy German weather.
The rain on Wednesday was so heavy that a part of the roof burst, sending water bucketing down on to a corner of the pitch and forcing photographers to change position.
Still, the incident did serve to prove that Germans really do have a sense of humour, with the stadium DJ playing "Raindrops keep falling on my head".
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