German soccer captain Michael Ballack may be in no rush to sign a new contract for his club Chelsea but there is one commitment he seems happy to make. The 31-year-old star footballer married his long-term girlfriend Simon Lambe in a private ceremony on Monday attended by friends and family.

There had been intense media speculation about when the footballer was actually tying the knot. Ballack's management company, Performance Plus, confirmed to SPIEGEL ONLINE that the wedding was to take place on Monday at a registry office in Berg near Munich.

The couple were married by Mayor Rupert Monn at Schloss Kempfenhausen. The newlyweds are to celebrate with a small party on Monday evening at the exclusive Bavarian Yacht Club on the idyllic Lake Starnberg. The couple are then to exchange vows in a church on Tuesday after which around 400 guests have been invited to a big wedding party at the same yacht club on Tuesday.

Local people have been telling the press for weeks that the couple were celebrating at Starnberg. Mayor Ferdinand Pfaffinger told Die Welt newspaper that while he had not heard anything officially about the wedding, "In Starnberg, everyone knows he is getting married here."

Ballack is coming back to familiar territory. He and Lambe and their three sons, Louis (6), Emilio (5) and Jordi (3) lived in a house on the lake while he played for top German soccer club Bayern München from 2002 to 2006.