Deutschland

Berlin

Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder was sober on Sunday night and drunk on Monday morning, and both conditions were entirely justified. When the polling booths closed and the first exit polls were published on German television at 6 p.m. on Sunday, the rival camps were so close that either of them might have ended up with a tiny majority but, as an evening of great confusion and excitement wore on, Mr Schroeder’s conservative opponents seemed to move into the lead, which was what most of the German press reported the next morning.