I had a last minute business trip to Warsaw yesterday so I stopped by to visit the new National Stadium, where in less than 2 weeks, the opening match of EURO 2012 will be played.
During the flight, I read that the European Union Court of Justice had just ruled against the Swiss chocolate company Lindt. For 60 years, Lindt has produced chocolate in the shape of a rabbit, wrapped in gold paper and a red ribbon. An Austrian chocolate company tried to make the same chocolate rabbit and Lindt sued and lost.
60 years is a long time. 56 years is also a long time.
The day before my trip to Warsaw, I was with friends in Basel to see the friendly match between Suisse and Germany. Suisse had not beaten their neighbor in 56 years. It was in 1956 when Suisse last won a match against Germany.
Germany is ranked second in the world and is a favorite to win the EURO 2012. Suisse is a decent team, ranked 18th in the world but did not qualify for this EURO. Most people gave the Swiss no chance.
The stadium is situated on the right bank of the Vistula river. Most of the tourist attractions, including the Old Town, are on the other side and are at a higher elevation. So there are many spots on the left bank where one has a spectacular view of the stadium.
After concluding my business, I went to the Warsaw Chopin Airport to fly back to Zurich. In the duty free shop at the airport, I saw this block of chocolate. Poland is ready for the EURO!
During the flight, I read that the European Union Court of Justice had just ruled against the Swiss chocolate company Lindt. For 60 years, Lindt has produced chocolate in the shape of a rabbit, wrapped in gold paper and a red ribbon. An Austrian chocolate company tried to make the same chocolate rabbit and Lindt sued and lost.
60 years is a long time. 56 years is also a long time.
The day before my trip to Warsaw, I was with friends in Basel to see the friendly match between Suisse and Germany. Suisse had not beaten their neighbor in 56 years. It was in 1956 when Suisse last won a match against Germany.
Germany is ranked second in the world and is a favorite to win the EURO 2012. Suisse is a decent team, ranked 18th in the world but did not qualify for this EURO. Most people gave the Swiss no chance.
well it was an amazing game. The scoring went like this: Suisse 1 Germany 0, 2-0, 2-1, half time, 3-1, 3-2, 4-2, 4-3, and the final score was 5-3. The stars for the Suisse were two players who played on the same team in the German League, Derdiyok the scorer of 3 goals and Barnetta who provided all 3 assists to Derdiyok.
They both played for Bayer Leverkusen and amazingly, both players were let go at the end of this season. May be they were very motivated on Saturday.
After the match, the German trainer of the Swiss team was diplomatic. He said, may be this is a good omen for Germany because in the last World Cup, Suisse beat Spain and Spain went on to win.
But another omen is bad. The last time Germany gave up 5 goals was in April 2004. It was a friendly against Romania and in Bucharest, the Germans were embarrassed 5-1 (quiz: who scored the only goal for Germany that day?). Germany then went to the EURO 2004 in Portugal and was eliminated in the first round.
Which German team will show up next month at EURO 2012?
Perhaps, a Swiss rabbit will tell us. Remember Paul the octopus from WC 2010? well now the Swiss figure skating champion Sarah Meier has a rabbit that will predict the winner of each EURO match.
At the moment, there is a contest to name this rabbit. Rabinho is popular. So is Saradona.
Suisse may not qualify for the EURO but we have the rabbit that will decide who wins the tournament. And Austria better not copies our rabbit.
next week: my exclusive preview of the EURO 2012.
Answer to quiz: in that game in 2004, Romania scored the first 5 goals and in the 88th minute, a young 21 year old defender scored in his only third game for Germany. His name is Philip Lahm.
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