Hannover’s stadium is large and imposing but a bugger to get to,

a good 15 minute walk from the nearest S-Bahn (tram stop) and poorly signposted. The walk was pretty though, through an atmospherically deserted fairground and fluffs of flying cottonwood romantically drifting through the summer evening air.

Another warm evening bodes well for next year but it won’t be as sweltering as some recent World Cups such as Mexico 86, USA 94 or Korea 2002. The Europeans should have an advantage therefore and remember no South American team has ever won in this continent.

For some reason the Germans had all adopted Mexico as their team for the evening, painting their cheeks in the tricolore and chanting ‘Me-HEE-Ko!’ I did spy two locals bravely cheering for Japan but what the Nippon fans must have made of these gaijins’ Chinese coolie hats…

Sitting a few rows in front of me was Arsene satta king Wenger, who coached in Japan before he came to Arsenal and who knows one day may return there, possibly as national team manager.

Given the friendly occasion and the country involved it was no surprise when a Mexican wave started, except that it took 42 minutes to get going.

More Mexicans than Japanese had made the trip although the latter outnumbered the former 10 to 1 in the press box. Nippon fans have yet to generate the noise their European or South American counterparts do but that is no bad thing. I have to say they are the most friendly and pleasant fans I have yet encountered (the worst would be Yugoslavia or Turkey) and have a healthy proportion of women amongst their ranks.

It is a real mistake to assume fans from a ‘baby’ footballing country like Japan, Australia or the USA are less knowledgeable than us Old Worlders. Quite the opposite in my experience – the need to hunt down information from beyond the major media sources hones their taste and scent for football knowledge.

As a journalist I love the ordeal of international tournament press conferences. I say ordeal because there are so many languages to translate. Last night we had Spanish, Portuguese, English, Japanese and German, rather like the street language spoken by Harrison Ford in Blade Runner.