Bryony Jones BBC News, in Berlin

Police do not want a repeat of Euro 2000 violence at the World Cup

"Who is most dangerous? Well in terms of football, it's got to be Germany, because they always win, but in terms of security, it doesn't matter which team we are up against - we have no indication of any kind of organised hooligan activity."

David Swift, Acting Chief Constable of Staffordshire Police and the UK's top police officer in all things football - both at home and abroad - has visited Germany to discuss some of the policing plans for next summer's World Cup.

"If there is going to be a problem, it is going to be with a group of fans, drinking somewhere, probably the day before a match, where some incident will happen which has the potential to escalate.

"It could be anything - a landlord wanting to close up, or a bar running out of beer, but we hope that by taking a friendly, open and high-visibility approach, we can diffuse any such situations before they get out of hand."

More than 100,000 fans are expected to travel to Germany to support the England team, but only a fraction of those are likely to secure tickets for the matches - the first of which, against Paraguay, takes place on 10 June in Frankfurt.

British bobbies

The German authorities are encouraging people to come anyway, by putting up giant screens in parks, town centres and even floating on the river Main in Frankfurt.

Mr Swift does not expect the event to pass off entirely peacefully, but hopes the presence of British "bobbies on the beat" alongside their German counterparts will go some way to helping stop any potential trouble.

And he hopes that England fans will do their bit to help repair the damage done to their name over 20 years.

"It would be fair to say that England has a reputation that has preceded it in the past. It was earned, and once earned it is very difficult to remove.

"But there have been significant changes in England and in the England fans' behaviour in recent times - the government took a very strong line on dealing with football violence and we now have some quite repressive laws."

CCTV operations

He is referring to the banning orders which can be used to prevent fans who are convicted, or in some cases even suspected, of football-related offences from attending matches either at home or abroad.

There are currently some 3,100 of these orders in place, forcing those subject to them to hand over their passports and report to their local police station whenever England is playing abroad.

Mr Swift expects that figure to rise by several hundred in the months leading to the start of the tournament - even though some of the orders now in place will have lapsed by then.

Police across the UK are working on 26 "discreet operations" to gather intelligence - anything from CCTV footage to mobile phone records are being scrutinised with the aim of stopping anyone identified as a potential problem from being able to get to Germany.

"There is always a risk," he admits. "It is inevitable when there are so many people involved, but we are taking action so that we can manage that risk.

"I am optimistic that we can have a good tournament where England's previous reputation will not go before it."