Podcasts · Inside Politics with Hugh Linehan

Germany at a crossroads: football, political frustration and the far right

8 Jul 2026 · 41 min

For Germany, football is often a reflection of the nations’ stability.

“When Germany is going well, things are going well on the pitch” Irish Times Berlin correspondent Derek Scally tells the Inside Politics podcast.

Following another premature exit from a world cup tournament they won only 12 years ago; in football, as in German politics, the future is uncertain.

Host Hugh Linehan asks where the major fault lines are in the upcoming federal elections in September. Elections, Scally explains, that are likely to be won by the far-right party Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) bar any major shifts.

“Establishment parties are seen as lacking ideas and energy” Scally says. “The sense of a government exhausting its political potential seems to be a general agreement around Berlin”.

Europe’s biggest economy is vulnerable on a number of fronts. It relies on Chinese manufacturing for its automotive sector, while facing major competition from increasingly popular, often cheaper, Chinese car makers.

Though the Christian Democrats’ Fredrick Merz has only been Chancellor for a year, “frustration” and “fatigue” are already creeping into public sentiment, Scally says.

Could his 34-point plan announced last week, including pension reforms, tax cuts, and business deregulation, turn things around?

Produced by Andrew McNair

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