Germany-Turkey, last football day in Switzerland

With tonight’s game Switzerland’s Euro 2008 will draw to a close. The Euro 2008 party will continue in Vienna with the second semifinal game tomorrow and the final on Sunday.

According to today’s estimates there will be around 50,000 German fans and 30,000 Turkish fans (numbers that don’t shock the authorities following the Oranje wave of last week, there were 180,000 fans in Basel last saturday).

The Swiss police considers the game a “moderately risky one”. There will be some German policemen and between 20-30 Turkish officers.

The heat and the number of people is cause of concern when it comes to alcohol consumption. Last Saturday, during the Netherlands-Russia game, 842 people required medical aid following alcohol abuse. The Basel authorities advise fans to drink enough water and to wear something on their heads.

The Basel hotels are full and there might be issues with the traffic since quite a few Germans will cross the border. Deutsch Bahn trains will increase their numbers to make access to Switzerland simpler for the German fans.

Many Turkish fans will already be in Basel: the Feldbergstrasse in the Petit-Huningue area is known as the “Little Istanbul” (hometown of Eren Derdiyok). There are over 30,000 Turks here and the smell of kebab is everywhere.
It will certainly be a long night in Basel, and hopefully a great end to Switzerland’s highly satisfying management of such an important event (to think that the Swiss team could have been there tonight!).