If you always wondered what Franz Beckenbauer was doing on the 15th of September 1982 from 11.45am to 7.40pm…

By: Jan | October 30th, 2007

Franz Beckenbauer Stasi …then let me help you out and fill you in with the details.

11.45am Beckenbauer uses the border crossing at Heinrich-Heine street and declares his intentions to leave the same day again.
2.10pm Beckenbauer arrives at his hotel. A bit later he goes to a French restaurant. He then has a chat with Günther Netzer and gives an interview to Junge Welt. He returns to his room.
4.55pm Beckenbauer leaves the hotel again.
6.05pm Beckenbauer and some companions enter the Mocca-Café, where he has to sign 25 to 30 printed menus with his autograph. The staff later serves an extra dessert consisting of ice with fruits and alcohol. This dessert wasn’t declared on the menu and Beckenbauer doesn’t need to pay for it.
7pm Beckenbauer and his companions leave the restaurant again.
7.40pm Beckenbauer arrives at the stadium.

At this point I probably won’t have to mention that the border Beckenbauer had crossed, stood between West Berlin and East Berlin and the Stasi (East Germany’s secret police) had taken him under surveillance using the alias Rasen 20 (Pitch 20) - Libero 10 would have been too obvious I suppose.

The reason why Beckenbauer travelled to East Berlin was a Champions League match between Hamburg and Dynamo Berlin (1-1). Beckenbauer no longer played for Hamburg, but was working as a reporter for the tabloid Bild. The Stasi didn’t just look after Beckenbauer. The whole HSV delegation was heavily monitored, resulting in a total of 300 pages worth of surveillance protocols.

Uniformed Fans What the regime feared even more than a football club from the west though, were its own people. And given the possibility of a PR disaster, with a crowd full of east Germans cheering on the western scum, they decided to control the crowd and fill the ranks with regime friendly uniformed people from the state’s extensive bureaucratic apparatus. This made sure, “that no expressions of sympathy for the guests” took place. It also meant that any normal fan behaviour and football match atmosphere was completely absent from the stands.

The surveillance protocols have now been handed over to Hamburg’s club museum, where they will be examined a bit further and put on display for the visitors. A little reminder that one part of Germany continued to live under a totalitarian regime after World War 2 had ended. If you want to learn more about this chapter of German history, without having to dig your nose too deep into too many books, you should check out the excellent Oscar winning movie The Lives of Others.

Hamburg would end up winning the second leg at home 2-0 and eventually the club made it to the final, where they beat Juventus Turin 1-0, thanks to a long rage strike by Felix Magath.