Euro 2024 Diary: Planes, trains and Poldolski kebabs as England vs Slovakia looms
A long day waiting around for planes finally gets me back to Germany and Lucas Podolski's kebab emporium here in Dusseldorf ahead of England vs Slovakia in nearby Gelsenkirchen
Happy Matchday from Germany ahead of the big game, after a long day’s travel to get back to Euro 2024.
Tough and gruelling, challenging and distressing - and that was just attempting to get breakfast here, amid hordes of hungover Germans who had been celebrating long and hard after their 2-0 win over Denmark on Saturday night.
The match had actually been halted for a while due to the dreadful weather.
Which co-incidentally was just before I was about to board my delayed flight from Paris to Dusseldorf.
The Lucas Podolski kebab emporium here in Dusseldorf city centre sells a kebab called: Kebab of Champions. CREDIT:
I wouldn’t say I’m a nervous flier, I just don’t like the feeling of taking off and landing - and especially don’t like the feeling of turbulence, even more so after a man sadly died recently after his plane dropped hundreds of feet during a particularly bad bout.
So, as everyone was boarding in Paris - after an already long day, following a relatively early start to Heathrow to fly to Charles De Gaulle - I was like a dog, you know, when they’d rather not go anywhere.
If I’d had hind legs at that moment, under those dark, gunmetal grey, forbidding skies, after a hot, sunny day, with a huge thunderstorm imminent, I would have sat on them, refused to move and dug in.
As the skies darkened still further, the news filtered though still further that Germany’s game in Munich had been stopped due to torrential rain and lightning - which was very, very frightening. To me, at any rate.
Even the plane was slightly concerning, as it was far smaller than I expected, as it was such a short hop. Two seats either side of the aisle.
If I’d been told I’d have had to sit on the pilot’s lap to save space I wouldn’t have been surprised. At one stage I did actually look out the window just to reassure myself it didn’t have propellers.
Anyway, wimp that I am, despite a few wobbles, we eventually got to Dusseldorf in one piece, to learn Kai Havertz scored again (etc, etc), before getting the train into the main railways station.
It was nearly 1am but the area around the Hauptbanhofstrasse is always lively - and so it proved.
Not that long ago, a heady concoction of drunk German football fans mixed with plenty of English ones too would have been a tinderbox. Now it almost goes unnoticed. And that is a good thing.
Also good was the fact that I managed to locate another of Lucas Podolski’s kebab emporiums.
Regular readers may recall my sheer disappointment when I found myself literally the wrong side of the tracks of a Lucas Podolski kebab emporium in Cologne last week.
Suffice to say I had to sample one last night.
Which like Podolski’s Arsenal career, consisted of some fantastic highlights, but was ultimately slightly disappointing, because it didn’t deliver on its initial, exciting promise. Still love him though. And his kebabs too. Obviously.
Daily List:
Travel the 45 minutes from Dusseldorf Hauptbanhof to Gelsenkirchen Hauptbanhof
Get from central station to the AufSchalke Arena - for the first time since I saw Arsenal play Schalke 04 in the Champions League back in 2001)
Get back from the stadium to central station (see reports of England’s last game in Gelsenkirchen vs Serbia for reports on how bad the transport was)
Leave Gelsenkirchen and get back to Dusseldorf
Avoid visiting the Lucas Podolski kebab emporium next to Dusseldorf - as I’ve already used (eaten) my yearly quota of kebabs.
As my wonderful partner - who’s trying to help me shed a bit of timber - said in exasperation in a Sunday morning WhatsApp to me, as to why I was so excited about stumbling across a late night Lukas Podolski kebab emporium, “why, he’s not serving them, is he?’
………
PS:
Waiting at Paris’ Charles De Gaulle for many hours wasn’t all that bad, as I managed to listen to a slice of Glastonbury, including Fontanes and English Teacher, who were both brilliant. As an added bonus, thankfully I also missed Coldplay.