During the Second World War, the Netherlands was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany. Major cities like Rotterdam were heavily bombed, thousands lost their lives or were wounded or displaced, whilst the country’s Jewish population was decimated by the wave of deportations to the death camps in the East.
This became poignantly captured in Anne Frank’s Diary.
Later, the entire population endured mass hunger – the sick and the elderly died, and others were force to eat roots and tree bark to survive.
But among the everyday losses that left a lasting impression was something deceptively simple: bicycles. In a country where cycling was already deeply embedded in daily life, bicycles were not just transport but a basic necessity. Their confiscation by occupying forces became part of a broader memory of disruption and scarcity—less dramatic than battlefield events, but felt in the rhythm of ordinary life.
After the war, this detail settled into Dutch collective memory as one of many symbols of wartime deprivation. Over time, it became a shorthand anecdote: a way of capturing, with a slightly ironic edge, how thoroughly everyday normality had been stripped away.
Decades later, the image resurfaced in an unexpected place: football terraces. Dutch supporters are known for sharp, sometimes self-deprecating humour in chants and banter, and references to bicycles occasionally appear as part of that repertoire. It works precisely because it is so culturally specific—an everyday object elevated into a symbol of identity and historical memory, then repurposed as a playful jab in the high-energy world of football rivalry.
Whenever the Netherlands and Germany meet in an international match, Dutch supporters will almost certainly unfurl banners demanding the return of their beloved cycles.
And some people have gone further. Before the 1990 World Cup, Dutch TV carried an interview with a man living near the border, who took great delight into crossing into Germany at night and stealing bicycles as a belated act of one man revenge.
This is just one of the many stories and anecdotes published in a book which has just been published called Football and War.
If you would like to know more or find out how you might be able to get a free copy please let us know.
