Or you weigh up the fact that he's made California his postfootball home and you're instinctively suspicious because surely only reptiles choose to put themselves in the way of that kind of heat.

Or you watch him firmly but delightfully dodge yet another question about whether or not he's going to stay on as coach after all this is over and you can't shift the feeling that while he'd be eager to have his name down for the Ceili Mor of a World Cup on home soil, maybe the Ploughing Championships of qualification for Euro 2008 isn't his idea of a good time.

Then you talk to people and dig back through the archives and you realise that this is just the way of it with him.

All his life, he's sent people one way before shooting off the other, unbalancing them, confounding them. When he was at Spurs in the mid-'90s and serious money was starting to flood in the gates of the Premiership, a lot of the players started buying Porsches.

Klinsmann drove around in a Volkswagon Beetle even though at that stage . . . nearing the end of his career and with a cute business head on him . . .he would have been almost certainly the second wealthiest person at the club after Alan Sugar. And for all the smiley, happy persona he now radiates, it was well-known back then that his ego was such that he was pretty much uncoachable. Sugar memorably declared he wouldn't wash his car with Klinsmann's shirt.

It's hard to square that figure with the one who, a decade later, has apparently managed to settle what was fast approaching a blood feud between Oliver Kahn and Jens Lehmann. At every turn during this tournament, Klinsmann has made a point of praising Kahn for his attitude and his willingness to work with Lehmann and help him out. It got to the point where in a press conference last week, Kahn held his hands up and said, "Maybe I was a little uptight in the past." Qualifying for the World Cup semi-final is one thing but getting Oliver Kahn to publicly show humility is another entirely.

Such is the atmosphere he's managed to create in taking Germany from as low an ebb as they'd known in decades to the brink of another World Cup final appearance. On Friday night, Christophe Metzelder, the centre-half who's sworn not to shave off his beard until Germany lose, tried to shed a little light on the way he's run things and the impression he made on the squad when first he took charge.

"He saw some things in us two years ago that nobody else saw, not even us, " said Metzelder. "He was very optimistic even when he was criticised and he kept being that way. He has us very well prepared for all this. It's his vision for us as players that has made the difference. In the beginning, we couldn't believe the things he said. He said we want to be the world champions and we are able to do it and we are going to cope with the big nations. And this was even though we did not play well two years ago in Portugal.

So his vision was very important.

"We had struggled to qualify for the European Championships and hadn't done so well when we got there. The whole of German football was on the way down, it seemed.

And a new coach comes and says, 'I want to win the championship.' It was different. He got criticised for it. But he created a great atmosphere in this team. That's one of the major parts of the success."

It wasn't only the players he surprised with his attitude when he took over in the wake of Rudi Voller's departure. In an early interview, he raged . . .

politely, now, but raged all the same . . . against the machine that has run German football since time began. More than that, he wanted to use his time in charge to change the country as much as the country's football.

"We need to question every single ritual and habit. And we need to do it continuously . . .

and not just in football. There's nothing bad about this.

Reforms don't happen in phases. They need to be part of an ongoing process, one that doesn't stop when the World Cup is over. Winning it would give us the chance to show the world who we are.

We have the opportunity to redefine Germany: to create a national brand."

At the time, he was excoriated. The hammering he took not just from the tabloids but from the snootier side of the press as well was savage. The general attitude was that maybe Klinsmann ought to have been spending a little more time sorting out somebody to cover the front post at corners and a little less trying to be an unelected Chancellor.

Attention focused on all the things he was doing that were out of the ordinary. His fitness trainer was an American, Mark Verstegen, and when it was found out that one of his methods for building core strength was to use harnesses and bungee cords, Bild in particular went to town. When it further emerged that Klinsmann's head scout was going to be Swiss rather than German and that he proposed appointing the coach of the German hockey team to the post of Director of Sports at the German FA, the odds began to lengthen about him even lasting until the World Cup. It didn't help his popularity that he'd introduced a new style of play, moving to 4-4-2 and away from the 3-5-2 that had been the way of German teams for generations. Still, the players trusted him, even when results gave them little cause to.

"We definitely needed some time to adapt to the new style with the players we have, " says Metzelder. "And it meant that we lost some matches.

But for us, the focus was always on June 9. Everything that we did with our American fitness guys and our new style was aimed towards being ready for the start of this tournament. Now we've shown that we've had a good preparation. Jurgen has prepared the team very well with the American fitness trainers who were criticised and psychological help for us as well."

Tuesday will be a test of how far the whole project has come, for the lowest point of Klinsmann's reign was unquestionably the 4-1 defeat to Italy in Florence in March.

It was after that that one paper suggested he go ask the women's coach for advice.

Another declared that his continued living in California was "insolent and outrageous". Two days after the game, Bild wrote: "If Klinsmann really does board that plane now, he'd better just stay in the United States."

The turnaround has been astonishing. Klinsmann is easily the most popular person in the country just now, although Lehmann's stock predictably went skywards on Friday night. The feel-good factor that Klinsmann set out to create is here, as vital and vibrant as you could get. People are talking about a country reborn, a new sense of national pride not seen since the Wall came down. What they say, however, is that the fall of the Wall brought only a fleeting glimpse of what they're seeing now. Germany is doing exactly as Klinsmann was lampooned for suggesting it do. Showing the world who it is, redefining Germany, creating a national brand. And they love him for it.

There's little doubt that it can last until next Sunday.

Italy hold no mystery for Germany and Tuesday night looks for all the world like a game that will take not much more than a goal to decide it, if it can be decided at all without penalties. After that, who knows?

There's a lovely story about Klinsmann which you hope against hope isn't apocryphal.

His wife is American and the move to Huntingdon Beach, California came after the 1998 World Cup. The anonymity suited him perfectly, although after a while, he started to miss having a game to play. So he did what any other stranger in a strange land might do. He spotted a group of players kicking around on a local sportsground and asked had they room for one more. The guys said sure, completely oblivious as to who it was walking among them.

Since then, apparently, he likes to do it from time to time just for someone to play with.

He never lets on and nobody ever asks.

Guess if they win next Sunday night, that's his cover blown to bits.

OPERATIC ITALIANS TO FINALLY WRITE OFF THE GERMANS WORLD CUP

SEMI-FINAL GERMANY v ITALY Tuesday, Dortmund, 8.00 Live, RTE 2, 7.30 In a way, it's funny that it took until they came up against a good side for us to see the Germany of lore. Friday night's win on penalties over Argentina was old money Germany, notbeaten-till-they're-six-feet-under Germany and, yes, never-write'em-off Germany. They never managed the whizz of the group games or the bang of the opening against Sweden and they never got Bernd Schneider or Michael Ballack purring from midfield. Even Miroslav Klose, despite his exhumation of an equaliser, wasn't half as effective as in the second round game.

And yet for all that, even those of us who just couldn't see them pulling it off again have to admit that they're definite contenders now. A win away from their eighth final, something even Brazil can't match. Stupid game.

And in their way stand Italy, the story of whose World Cup win . . . if pulled off . . . would test the patience of any publishing house's commissioning editor. In the life of this squad and this manager, Italian football has had to deal with doping allegations, corruption and match-fixing scandals, the rise and fall of a government built on the back of footballing success (and excess) and now the apparent suicide attempt of one of its best-known and best-loved former players.

Lift the trophy next Sunday and there's bound to be an opera in there somewhere.

Luckily for a side with so much going on beyond the pitch, they've been granted a relatively secure passage on it so far. They've been allowed to mix impressive performances . . . against Ghana, the Czech Republic and Ukraine . . .

with colder ones against the USA and Australia and still arrive here unbeaten.

Furthermore, some of their players are discovering the knack of growing into the tournament just in time. On Friday night, Luca Toni grabbed his first two World Cup finals goals and Francesco Totti had a big hand in two of the three that won the game. And neither of them was even the best player on the pitch, not with Gianluca Zambrotta showing again why he's been the best of the fullbacks in the tournament and Fabio Cannavaro proving again to be one of the very best central defenders in the world.

Where the Italians aren't quite as reliable a proposition is in the centre of midfield. Mauro Camoranesi (right) and Gennaro Gatuso will thump and torment Ballack and Thorsten Frings all night long on Tuesday . . . it will be a surprise if at least one of them doesn't end the night suspended from either the final or thirdplace play-off . . . but they never convince totally when in possession. Camoranesi took a couple of pot-shots on Friday night that ended up looking as out of place as his ponytail.

Theoretically, this is where Totti comes in. In fairness, the good has outweighed the bad for him in this World Cup. Excellent against Ghana and Ukraine, he struck the winner against Australia. But it was a dip in between that caused Marcello Lippi to smarten him up with 80 minutes on the bench against the Aussies. It serves as a reminder that he can, to say the least, be flighty. Not for the fist time, Italy need him to be more Beatles than Rutles.

Because even though Germany weren't as clever with the all-singing stuff against Argentina, they did at least dispel some of the doubts over their defence. Roberto Ayala's opener aside, the two centrehalves got toes and headers in when needed and the right-back Arne Freidrich kept Carlos Tevez safely under house arrest for the whole night. That they didn't have to deal with Lionel Messi at any stage was an unexpected blessing; their reward is not to have to face anything like him on Tuesday night either.

For all that . . . and wary of the fact the Germany's name doesn't so much appear to be on the cup as embedded in it, stick-of-rockstyle . . . Italy are looking more and more confident and secure.

Canavarro, you suspect, would have broken a leg rather than allow two free headers in the box while defending a lead in the last 10 minutes the way Argentina did for Klose's equaliser on Friday.

More of the same can see them through here.

Verdict Italy