England's World Cup pinstripe army

They prefer champagne to lager, canapés to pies - or even prawn sandwiches - jet all over the globe on business and earn serious money.

These City fans aren't based in Manchester, Birmingham or Hull. Their home ground is the City of London, and they are the pinstripe army following England to the World Cup.

The unprecedented high cost of going to the finals in Japan means many of England's regular supporters cannot afford the trip. Instead, a new, well-heeled breed of fan will be cheering England on as they bid for glory.

All over the Square Mile at the end of May, empty desks will appear in banks and brokerages as high fliers swap their suits for England shirts and head to the Far East.

Their profile is mostly single, white, male, thirtysomething and highly-paid. Typical is Simeon Arthur, 31, a bachelor from Wandsworth who works for royal bank Coutts & Co.

He said: "I'm going for the first four England matches - although the fourth one's conditional on them qualifying. My boss thinks I'm coming back after that - but just in case he's hired someone to replace me for the whole of June."

Although he has wangled free flights through a business contact, Mr Arthur still expects to spend £5,000, much of it on four and five-star hotels.

Not every City supporter is expecting top-notch comfort. Graham Plain, 35, from Brockley, may be "one of the best-paid IT contractors in the City", according to friends, but he said: "I'm staying in a £15-anight youth hostel in Tokyo. Then in Osaka I've got hotel rooms. That's all that was available, but I don't mind where I stay. It's going to be a great week - football heaven."

According to Englandfans, which is distributing tickets to official England supporters, the travelling contingent will include 146 people in banking, 45 company directors and 339 sales or marketing executives.

But the true figure may be more than 1,000 such fans because City workers are often wealthy or well connected enough to have arranged tickets independently.

They include Jason Peters, 32, of Belsize Park, who will put aside his job for a mobile internet firm to spend two-and-a half weeks cheering on the national team. He expects the trip, independently organised with two friends, to cost around £4,000.

Like many England supporters in Japan, it will be his first World Cup. "I was never really attracted to the idea because I thought it would mainly involve getting extremely drunk and being herded around like animals," he said. "Hopefully this will be a bit different because there will not be so many fans there. I hope itis more of a holiday, and we will be able to take in some cultural activities."

He has tickets for nine games: England's first-round games, two Italy games, Germany v Ireland, Japan v Russia and two second-round matches. The group plan to base themselves in Tokyo for 10 days, taking internal flights or the bullet train to matches. Then they will go to Osaka, where England play Nigeria. "After that it depends who goes through," said Mr Peters

Hedge fund account director Graham Martin, 35, from Sevenoaks, has tickets for England's first two games and expects his 10-day trip to cost almost £2,000. "This World Cup appealed because hopefully there is less likelihood of trouble. I'd rather watch football without hooligans," he said.

The pinstripe army are not all World Cup novices. Simon Russell, a banker who earned more than £1 million last year, will be going to his fifth World Cup - he has been to Mexico, Italy, the USA and France.

"I got the England-Argentina ticket through a colleague in Tokyo who entered a lottery, then he bought us tickets for the Nigeria game off a local tout," he said. "And I am taking some clients to the Sweden game on a corporate package."

Thanks to discounts through his City firm's Japanese clients, he thinks he will spend around £6,000 for three weeks - small change to a man with a millionpound house in Wandsworth. "If England do well that'll be a bonus," said Mr Russell, 32. "I just like the World Cup experience. I've been to Tokyo on business, and look forward to seeing the rest of Japan."

Michael Bentley, 33, is a City financial analyst with a six-figure salary though, like most of his colleagues, he prefers not to talk about money. He and two friends bought tickets online from Fifa more than a year ago

BA flights cost £700, match tickets £100 each, and he expects hotels to cost £70 a night. "We've booked to the quarter-finals but we'll only stay if England go that far," he said. "I've never been to Japan, so I want to see as much as possible."

Not everyone is impressed. Kevin Miles of the Football Supporters Association said: "It's all very well for these yuppies blowing their overpaid bonuses on the World Cup but sadly the games are out of reach for ordinary fans who keep football going every week.

"Even when tournaments are closer to home far too many tickets go to corporate sponsors - one-game-in-a-lifetime high rollers - instead of supporters on ordinary incomes."

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