Kaiser hits back in World Cup 2006 stadia row

FRANZ BECKENBAUER, president of the World Cup 2006 organising committee, has hit back at a report which claims some of the venues for this summer’s tournament are not up to scratch.

The Stiftung Warentest, a consumer watchdog, suggested four of the stadia - in Berlin, Leipzig, Kaiserslautern and Gelsenkirchen - were “substantially” unsafe while it deemed eight others “clearly” unsafe.

The report claims the grounds fall short of the necessary standards in areas such as crowd safety.