Bets, beer, barbecues and Beckham

England is partying like it has never partied before in a long weekend of unparalleled drinking, barbecuing, betting and taking of hangover cures.

With the happy coincidence of the Queen's Golden Jubilee with England's opening World Cup football game against Sweden this morning, the nation will turn the extended bank holiday into an unprecedented, hedonistic binge. And the sun even shone yesterday.

A new survey by the English Tourism Council predicts £1bn will be spent on domestic tourism, with as many as 20 million UK residents taking day trips.

But the World Cup in Japan and South Korea wins out over the Jubilee. While 44 per cent of the population intend to watch the football, one-in-three plan to go to a local Jubilee event. With just 4 per cent of the country taking a short break abroad, the message is clear: Britain is the place to be this weekend.

Pubs predict they will sell 25 million pints with 30,000 of them opening early for the morning games.

Like football teams attempting to outwit each other, the supermarket groups have launched their own strategies to quench the nation's thirst.

Sainsbury's – which has called its weekend plans Operation Battle Beckham – expects to sell eight million pints of beer and lager in four days, the equivalent of 1,000 pints a minute going through checkouts.

Tesco's own plan – Operation Owen – has seen the chain stock an extra three million pints of beer to go with an additional three million pizzas and five times the number of painkillers to cope with after-match hangovers. Seven tonnes of chicken tikka masala have already been sold while sales of barbecue food have leapt by 30 per cent.

Gambling on the World Cup will top £250m, claim bookies, while enormous sales of England flags prompted the AA to warn motorists that tying banners to car aerials or doors could lead to fines of up to £2,500 if police consider them dangerous.

About 63,000 England flags have already been sold at Sainsbury's. While the World Cup is likely proving a more compelling reason to party than the Jubilee, the monarch has not been neglected.

Safeway has noticed sales of canned fruit, jelly and custard are above normal sales. A spokesman for the chain said: "People are buying the ingredients for celebration trifles to mark the Jubilee."

Connex South Eastern predicts its trains will bring 200,000 people into central London tomorrow and almost a quarter of a million people on Tuesday for the climax to the Jubilee party.

It's not just booze and party food selling faster than a David Beckham free kick. There has also been a run on alarm clocks. With "sickies" expected to cost the nation as much as £3.2bn, the early wake-up call will not be to get to work on time but to get the television on in time. Hangover permitting, of course.