For econo-football connoiseurs

economics

Football and economics? Well, if you're bored with the excitements of real football, and thinks you need a dose of abstraction (or a diversion in the form of 'econo-talk': describing simple things in complicated ways), you can read Tim Harford's explanation of what economics has to offer football (particularly during penalty shoot-outs) in this little article. But that is not all.

If you like something a bit more serious, there is Branko Milanovic's lesson about globalization with a brilliant football analogy in his Taipei Times article. For masochists, there is his older paper on the link between globalization and footbal players.

But if, after you read these, you still can't have enough, just go to http://ideas.repec.org -- a repository of economic articles from around the world -- and type "football" in the search term. There are 174 papers to satisfy your needs (though, one wonders, why, oh why...?)