Munich

Abidjan and Munich – two cities that love football. Both have large stadiums that serve as the showplace for important football events. Munich is proud of its grand Allianz Arena with its 69,000 seats. Abidjan is just as enthusiastic about its Félix Houphouët Boigny Stadium with 50,000 seats. For more than thirty years the stadium has been named after the first president of the Ivory Coast, who led the country to its independence on 7 August 1960. Although both metropolises have many football buffs, they act out their passion for the sport in very different ways. In Munich the football fans are somewhat more ardent, even more excitable, while in Abidjan the people are usually only satisfied if the team has exclusively good results time and time again.

At the match between 1860 München and Koblenz on Wednesday, there aren’t many people in the Allianz Arena, which is probably because the teams are in the second league (which gives rise to less enthusiasm) and because Wednesday is a weekday (so most fans were at work). The mood in the stadium does not suffer, however. For the entire 90 minutes, the fans of the second Munich team cheer on their team. This is rare in Abidjan, where devotees only react now and then to the match. They applaud when the team offers a brilliant performance and, of course, when they shoot a goal. But they would never dance and sing throughout the entire duration of the match. Quite the contrary: if their team misses an obvious chance for a goal, they scold and insult the player responsible for the muff. In Abidjan, the fans react too impulsively and nervously, if not excessively. If the team has two consecutive bad results, the fans become enraged. So, sometimes it’s difficult for the players to get out of the stadium. There are cases where, after a disappointing match, they cannot leave the stadium without heavy police protection. Many fans will not return to the stadium as long as the team has a losing stretch.

In the Allianz Arena on Wednesday evening, when a player from 1860 München fails his dribble and the opponent takes the ball from him, the audience raises its voice only slightly to bemoan it, but then immediately began to urge the player on again. “We have to stand behind our team. They can make mistakes, but without our support, the team can’t make any advances,” says Karl, a young fan of 1860 München. However in both Abidjan and Munich the fans are not only “opponents” inside the football stadiums, but outside as well.

Thursday, 30 October, 12:15 PM. The headquarters of FC Bayern München on Säbener Strasse are besieged by over one hundred loyal fans of the outstanding Bavarian club. Slightly over 200 people are watching Jürgen Klinsmann and his players during training. Some of them are clutching jerseys or autograph cards with photographs of the FC Bayern players and hoping for an autograph from their idols, while others, eyes affixed to the viewfinders of their digital cameras, are shooting photo after photo of the twelve players of FC Bayern who are warming up on the field under the attentive gaze of their coach Klinsmann. Among these players, the substitutes, we recognize Daniel Van Buyten. The stars – Ribéry, Klose, Van Bommel, Ze Roberto, Lucio and Demichelis to name a few – are not present. The fans don’t mind; they’re happy to be here. “I’m really excited to see the players from my favourite team,” exults Klaus, a ten-year-old boy who is accompanied by his mother. There are also female fans and plenty of them. “We think the FC Bayern is great. We live only for this club,” affirm Erika and Sandra, for instance, who are taking snapshots from behind the barricades.

Suddenly Philip Lahm appears in street clothes. Hysteria breaks out. The fans squeal, jostle their way to the front of the crowd to get an autograph. The left-field defence player of FC Bayern is happy to take the time and plays along before escaping. The fans again turn their gaze to the playing field, where Klinsmann’s players, divided into two groups of six, play a hotly debated match, while others watch out for the arrival of another team celebrity or leisurely enter the FC Bayern “Service Centre” to purchase the club’s fan merchandise.

Amazingly you find people here who really do live for their team. You won’t find this kind of fan on the streets of Abidjan, although there are a few of them in Cote d’Ivoire as well. Compared to Munich, the women there would prefer to spend their time at the cosmetician’s making themselves pretty rather than “wasting” time watching a football team at training. They don’t vie for seats in the grandstand on Sundays; match days in Abidjan. With the exception of some extremely rare specimens of female football fans, most women one encounters in general at stadiums are there to sell juice, beverage cans and sandwiches. They go to the stadium to sell, not to cheer on a team. For them, a football match is an opportunity to do good business. Business sense quickly wins out over passion.