It is hard to imagine how much more evidence European policy makers need before conceding their eurozone growth plan is not working.

It transpires that as Germany’s footballers were surging triumphantly through the early stages of the World Cup, its companies and households were performing more like the England team, dumped out in the first round. Data released yesterday showed that even allowing for weather-related timing effects, the German economy underperformed expectations by shrinking 0.2 per cent in the second quarter of the year. The contraction dragged down second-quarter eurozone growth to nil and prompted German 10-year Bund yields to fall below 1 per cent for the first time in history.

The French economy was little better, flatlining for the second quarter in a row. With Italy already in recession, the core of the eurozone – which has yet to regain its output levels before the global financial crisis – is deep in trouble. Michel Sapin, the French finance minister, took the opportunity yesterday to state the blindingly obvious – that France would miss its fiscal target of 3.8 per cent of gross domestic product this year and could only reduce it “at an appropriate pace” thereafter.