This is a story written by Tilakavati, a russian devotee from Moscow who was there in the right moment:
On the day of the final football game between Germany and Argentina we were thrilled. There were quite a number of people among us who enjoy to watch good final football game. Especially that we were in Germany, we were attuned with the final game fever. One of us, mataji Adhi, daughter of Ashiriyadevi bought a fan garland with colors of German flag in the "football fan section" at the petrol station. This was the only possibility to get it, as it was Sunday.
When Swami Vishwananda was passing by, she got chance to hand it over to him, hoping that he will just hold it in his hands and bless it, but Swamiji joyfully took it from her and put around his neck, to our delight.
Walking around the compound like this, Swamiji was asking people whom do they cheer for, and who do they think will win.
Seeing that there was no more doubt for us that it was the auspicious sign that Germany will have better luck in the match.
This increased our spirit and Swamiji went smilingly outside the building to the place where the snacks were being sold, including pop corn machine.
As he knew that some from us were going to watch the game starting soon, Swamiji decided to make popcorn using the new popcorn machine for the first time himself. It was a lot of fun for him and for us, slowly people surrounded him, but he seemed not noticing it, as he was totally involved in the process of making popcorn, changing it in his own way, like adding sugar and salt together, reducing the level of oil etc, in spite of all objections of Bhageshri, that this is not the way of doing it.
All of a sudden a lot of steam and some smoke started to come out of the pot, probably due to the excess of sugar, and Swamiji was the first one to shout "Oh! it burns, it burns!!!"
After few moments the pot with cooking popcorn fell down inside the glass box and all the popcornes were saved. It was a lot of fun, and a lot of laughter.
We got to taste Swamiji´s made popcorn. Everybody got 1 piece. It was delicious and well cooked.
The final game was going to start soon, so people went away and Swamiji went to give interviews.
The first part of the game was pretty boring, nothing much happened until Swamiji came to the room where prabhus were watching the match. It was almost at the end of the 2nd half.
Prabhus started to ask and tell who from the German players should shoot the goal. Someone said, Mueller should. But Swamiji just waived his hand, meaning no. And really, Mueller, one of the best ones, as much as he tried could not shoot the needed goal.
The additional time was going to the end, and everybody understood, that in the final penalty part it will be harder to win.
But as a miracle, when everyone was pretty sure for the coming final penalty part, one German player, Goetze, all of a sudden was able to outwit the experienced Argentina´s goal keeper and shoot the first goal!
As it happened at the last minutes of the game, Argentina didn´t have time and chance to respond.
As you know, Germany won the world cup. We say, the Garland helped!
(... besides the nickname of the German coach Joachim Löw is "Yogi")
(Thank you, Tilakavati, for your article!)
