Cynics might wonder what kind of economic calamity must occur in Germany for corporate lawyers to finally admit that Europe’s most hyped legal market has so far delivered more of a whimper than a bang.

After all, at the time of frenzied German expansion in 2000 and 2001 by the leading London firms, the unchallenged mantra was that any firm with pretensions to international status had to have a major presence in Europe’s largest economy.