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WITH THANKS:
MATT HULL, CHRIS COWLEY, GREG
BOTT, YOUNG PINES, WILL DAW,
THOM ISOM
EDITORS:
PAUL GLEESON & DAN BYRNE
CHIEF SUB-EDITOR:
MATT HULL
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You have found our Christmas
present to you and we hope that
you enjoy it. Gift giving at this
time of year has a long tradition
- we have given gifts in midwinter
for much longer than we have
celebrated Christmas - and at its
heart is goodwill. With our gift
pack we continue this tradition
and in it there are articles centred
around perhaps the most famous
act of Christmas goodwill, the
Christmas Truce. There is also a
limited run poster showing you all
that we want for Christmas.
If Christmas is a time of gifts and
goodwill then New Year is the time
for plans and resolutions. We have
plans a-plenty and if you keep
checking twitter in early January
we will be breaking some news. In
the meantime it just remains for us
to wish you a Merry Christmas and
Happy New Year!
SPIEL CHRISTMAS GIFT PACK01
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WORD FROM THE
EDITORS
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Despite the recent ignorant
screechings of blockheaded
players and the ramblings of a
certain spittlelipped official one
of footballs greatest qualities is
its power to unite. In the wake
of the invasion of Iraq images of
soldiers kicking balls about with
ragged looking children in the
ruins of recently liberated towns
were abundant. A heartwarming
antidote to the pictures of charred
buildings and bodies. Winning
hearts, minds and feet.
There is one particular piece of
peacemaking football which holds
a special place in the popular
imagination though. In Christmas
1914, less than six months after
the beginning of the First World
War, a brief unofficiated truce
was held between the groups of
soldiers from both sides of the
trenches. Men who had been firing
at each other just days before met
and found that their enemies were
not so different from themselves;
working men who had been
wrapped in uniforms and sent
to kill each other. Carols were
sung; hands were shaken; tins
of bully beef were exchanged
for parcels of bratwurst. It has
also been widely asserted that,
at various points along the lines,
both sides took part in games of
football. Numerous letters sent
back from British units mention
matches between soldiers while
some correspondence recorded
a 3 2 victory to the German
side, perhaps an ominous portent
of painful fixtures to come. In an
interview nearly seventy years
later, Ernie Williams, veteran
of the 6th Cheshire Territorials
recalled the atmosphere at
one of the impromptu matches,
Everyone seemed to be enjoying
themselves. There was no sort of
ill will between us. There was no
referee. No tally. No score.
A friendly kickabout, like the
schoolyard games that many
would have been playing only a
few years before. And perhaps
there was no collective will for the
implementation of rules; maybe
they felt too much like orders. No
stomach, any longer, for matters
of yards and numbers. At our
historical remove its tempting to
read broader significance into
Ernies account.
There is, though, some dissenting
opinion on the matter of the
Christmas Truce matches.
Unsurprisingly, given the nature of
censorship during the period, there
is a lack of documentary evidence
of the games actually happening.
Historians, including the influential
Modris Eckstein, have declared
the idea of the matches by turns
politically nave and, with no-
mans land churned by artillery
fire and thick with barbwire and
barricades, physically impractical.
Christmas spirit and football
fandom, though, is an intoxicating
combination. Like all great
legends the Christmas Truce
football matches refuse to be
shackled to verifiable proof, it is
instead rooted in a deeper truth
of the power of play to heal even
the widest and bitterest of rifts.
The Premier League recently
announced a new under-12s
football competition, its name; the
Christmas Truce Tournament. The
matches are to be dedicated to
the memory of all who fell in the
Great War and played in Ypres,
just minutes from where the shells,
and perhaps for a few precious
minutes on one cold December
25th, the balls flew.
Words by - Matt Hull
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BULLY BEEF AND
BRATWURST: THE
CHRISTMAS TRUCETHE CHRISTMAS TRUCE, OR IN GERMAN DER WEIHNACHTSFRIEDEN, IS INEXPLICABLY
TIED TO FOOTBALL, DESPITE QUESTIONABLE EVIDENCE OF THE MATCH TAKING PLACE.
MATT HULL INVESTIGATES THE TRUCE AND ITS BROADER SIGNIFICANCE.
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DER WEIHNACHTSFRIEDENTHE FABLE OF THE CHRISTMAS TRUCE IS A STAPLE AT THIS
TIME OF YEAR. SCHOOLS RETELL THE TALE OF HOW, AMONGST
THE BLOODSHED AND SHELLS, THE TROOPS OF WORLD WAR ONE
DOWNED ARMS FOR A BRIEF HIATUS. YET WE RARELY HEAR THE
GERMAN PERSPECTIVE. CHRIS COWLEY INVESTIGATES.
For a long time, The First World
War was simply remembered
as The Great War. A war which
engulfed so much of Europe and
ended the lives of so many young
men that it has become shorthand
for the waste and futility of armed
combat.
Reading the poetry of Wilfred
Owen or Seigfried Sassoon to
begin to understand the brave
soldiers who fought and died
between 1914 and 1918 must have
been stretched. Writing this now, I
am glad it is a feeling I will never
truly know.
And yet, amid all of the bloodshed,
in the depth of December
1914, something extraordinary
happened. Something that would
send out a prevailing message
of humanity for all generations
to come. A game of football
took place between English and
German troops.
Admittedly, this is not the only
reported act of amity to take place
during what has become known
as The Christmas Truce, in which
cigarettes were shared, carols
were sung and fallen friends were
jointly remembered, it is perhaps
though the element which has
most vividly etched itself into
British folklore.
Its interesting then, that if you
were to ask many Germans about
their knowledge of this impromptu
international, they usually
respond with blank faces. Der
Weihnachtsfrieden is, of course,
remembered in Germany too,
but most of my colleagues, when
specifically quizzed about the
football match, had either never
heard of it or thought it had much
more to do with the French than
themselves - often citing the 2005
film, Joyeux Nol.
How could it be that a moment as
significant as this one could be so
well preserved in one culture and
not in the others? Is it simply the
case the events were described in
more detail or widely recorded in
one language than they were in
another? Perhaps, as the victors, it
makes sense that we would want
to maintain the few memories of
such a horrendous war that can
undeniably present our troops as
honourable, well principled men,
who were victims of a cruel fate.
Maybe that would not be the case
for those on the losing side.
Still, if either of these were the
reason for the fooball match
gradually petering out of memory,
then you would assume that all
other tales from the Christmas Truce
would do as well. It could well be
that the fact that this alone seems
to have dwindled in significance
has more to do with our nations
respective relationships with the
beautiful game than with the war
itself.
ASK MANY GERMANS ABOUT
THEIR KNOWLEDGE OF THIS
IMPROMPTU INTERNATIONAL,
THEY USUALLY RESPOND WITH
BLANK FACES.
Even listening to the commentary
and punditry surrounding The
Premiership nowadays, it is clear to
see that we English fans still think of
football as being, in its purest and
most authentic sense, an English
pastime. We are repeatedly
told that our domestic league is
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the best in the world, precisely
because its players are the only
footballers able to play with the
high octane gusto required to
compete at this top level. In other
words, it has become a medium
through which our plucky national
spirit, which is often cited as the
exceptional quality that through
the world wars, can be preserved
and propagated. It could well be
that it is this relationship between
football and British fighting spirit
that has both preserved and
made legend of that football
game, which took place one
Christmas Eve so long ago, where
in Germany it has been all but
forgotten.
Of course, this is not to say that
Germanys relationship with
football is any less strong; just
that it has a different meaning,
especially when you consider that
in terms of the national team,
Germany has also had a fair
amount more success than us.
Crucially these victories have also
come at times when Germany has
been going through something
of an upheaval. Whereas the
English relationship to the game
has become defined by the
preservation of our national
identity, Germanys has become
associated with its reinvention.
HOW COULD IT BE THAT A
MOMENT AS SIGNIFICANT AS
THIS ONE COULD BE SO WELL
PRESERVED IN ONE CULTURE
AND NOT IN THE OTHERS?
Take, for example, the 1954 world
cup final known as The Miracle
Of Bern. Going into the match
as a nation who had been torn
apart by two world wars and the
unforgivable atrocities committed
in the name of their Volk, Germany
was on its knees. The team faced a
Hungary squad, who were widely
believed to be the best in the
world, Germany were immense
underdogs. Within eight minutes of
play, all expectations appeared to
have been confirmed as Hungary
found themselves 2-0 up thanks to
goals from Puskas and Czibor. It
looked all over for the Germans,
when out of nowhere, they
suddenly found themselves back
in the game thanks to braces
from Max Morlock and Helmut
Rahn, who went on to bag his
2nd in the 84th minute, with what
would prove to be a winner and a
sensational comeback.
Germany were crowned world
champions and in an instant, the
nation had reason to celebrate.
However, it was more than just
a game. This was also the first
time since the end of WW2 that
the national anthem had been
played in public and is seen by
many scholars as a landmark
in German history as the point
they began to look forward to a
new future. This phenomenon of
reinvention through football was
again strengthened in the world
cup of 1990, when a reunified
Germany celebrated their first
World Cup victory together, since
the Berlin wall had been erected
in 1961. It proved to be a symbolic
moment in the coming together
of East and West, and again
strengthened footballs role as a
national game changer. Even now
in 2011, players like Mesut Ozil and
Lucas Podolski are challenging
conceptions of German national
identity, with many citizens from
migrant backgrounds looking to
them as role models.
With all of this in mind, it is perhaps
no surprise that a football match,
which took place on no mans
land in a war long gone would not
permeate a contemporary German
consciousness that is full of much
more radical associations with
football. For us, it is a reminder of
why we are proud to be British, but
for the Germans, it is a relic of the
nation they used to be.
Words by - Chris Cowley
SPIEL CHRISTMAS GIFT PACK