Five years ago this week… Vodafone and Liberty Global were back in talks to merge more of themselves across Europe, with plans for the German fixed line business to go to Vodafone, while the UK mobile network would go to Liberty. This did not look troublesome in the UK, where both brands held less than a third of the market, but many were expecting that the German trade regulator Bundeskartellamt would hold on to its old habit of rejecting cable mergers. Both operators were hoping that the seemingly merger-hungry European Commission would be able to override the German regulator, following on from its push for cable mergers in the Netherlands to rival KPN. In 2019, the EU approved Vodafone’s $22…