Schultheiss is a long-established Berlin brewery that makes a beer with a slightly unfashionable, working-class image not unlike that of the city's leading soccer club, Hertha BSC.
The two institutions have recently become entwined in a manner neither would have wished for, as neo-Nazi Hertha fans have adopted the beer's name as a coded slogan. Schultheiss! they roar from the terraces of the 1936 Olympic Stadium during each Hertha home game - stressing the syllables in such a way that they sound like Sieg Heil!
Shouting a Nazi slogan is enough to get a fan expelled from the stadium but the 500 stewards who patrol the terraces cannot sanction anyone for repeating the name of a popular beer. "We go after anyone who wears Nazi symbols or shouts Nazi slogans, But it's more difficult if someone shouts Schultheiss.
It sounds like Sieg Heil and we know it's supposed to but we can't wade in through the fans just because someone roars Schultheiss," according to Horst Brueckmann, one of Hertha's senior stewards.
The Schultheiss problem is symptomatic of a new sophistication in the tactics used by extreme right-wingers to infiltrate Germany's football clubs. Effective action by supporters' clubs has prevented organised neo-Nazi groups from gaining a foothold among fans.
But a small number of extremists can give an entire club a bad name, and Hertha has long had a reputation as a right-wing, racist club.
Referees at the Berlin club's matches were accustomed to hearing the word "Jew" roared at them if they made a decision against Hertha and black players from opposing teams were usually greeted with grunting noises.
When the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) started recruiting openly outside Hertha matches, the club decided to take action. In an effort to salvage its reputation, Hertha has launched a campaign against racism, using its top players to spread a message of tolerance.
A new rule has been written into Hertha's constitution which will ban from all their matches anyone caught repeating a Nazi slogan. Every week, the club auctions signed jerseys from Germany's top teams, sending the proceeds to foreign charities such as the churches in Africa or Arab women's groups. A tough, new policy in the stadium bans a long list of symbols, including the swastika, the Celtic cross and the Prussian imperial flag. Banned slogans include the SS motto Unsere Ehre heisst Treue (Our honour is loyalty) and the words of the Horst Wessel song.
Hertha's new rules have cleared their terraces of obvious neo-Nazi symbols but supporters' groups claim that it has not solved the problem of right-wing extremism among fans. Many neo-Nazis have responded to the measures by devising a sophisticated system of codes to advertise their political allegiance. Black, steel-capped boots are banned at Hertha matches but there is no rule against the black Fred Perry shirts with red and white piping favoured by rightwing skinheads. And, although few right-wingers wear swastikas on their sleeves, many wear patches with the number 88 within a garland of oak-leaves. The numbers refer to the eighth letter of the alphabet - 88 as in Heil Hitler.
Outside the Olympic Stadium, makeshift stalls sell badges declaring Ich bin stolz ein Deutscher zu sein (I am proud to be a German), alongside Hertha scarves and T-shirts.
Tougher security and an enlightened programme of anti-racist advertising may be as much as any football club can do to fight right-wing extremism. Hertha's problem is exacerbated by the fact that many of its newer fans come from the east of Berlin, where neo-Nazis concentrate much of their activity.
Public education exercises have been unable to prevent attacks on foreigners in eastern Berlin, although tough police action has had some success in deterring racist thugs in the neighbouring state of Brandenburg.
Many sociologists believe that improving social conditions and cutting unemployment will provide the key to luring eastern Germany's young people away from the extreme right. But most of those convicted for racist offences last year had jobs and came from relatively stable backgrounds, suggesting that the problem may primarily be one of law and order rather than social alienation.
