As a German, I found the appearances besides the soccer (hand in front of the mouth, appearance of the interior minister in the stadium or press conferences without players) irritating and much much worse than the soccer performance. Something must have happened in Germany in recent years to distract everyone from what is actually important at a World Cup. Becoming world champions. Even the newspapers, which have had 12 years to write their fingers to the bone about Qatar, are distracting from the real issue and trying to politicize the World Cup. No real football fan wants that. Germany was a football power for decades and the conditions to bring a useful team to the start should be given. All tournaments were accompanied by music. One remembers the team of 1974 with the song "Football is our life" - I wish that would have been the case this year as well.
I will start with the Bellini Brothers, who spiced up their music by changing South American singers in such a way that the whole thing got a realistic Brazilian background.
But you can also recognize real football culture from songs by Thees Uhlmann, AnnenMayKantereit, Sportfreunde Stiller or the Toten Hosen. Sad but true, we have lost all that.
