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It's that time again... got, got, need.

Since the first Panini World Cup album was launched in 1970, children - and some young at heart - have enjoyed collecting stickers of their favourite players.

But young football fans will have to pay an absolute fortune to get their hands on every sticker this summer, thanks to a hefty price hike.

One upon a time the stickers would set up back a few pence at a time, but just a packet of five will cost you a whopping 80p this time round.

That's a staggering 60 per cent rise on the price from just two years ago, when a packet of five Euro 2016 stickers would set you back 50p.

(Image: Fifa/Twitter)

But this doesn't take into account that it's pretty much impossible to not get any duplicate players in the first 137 packets you buy, meaning you're either going to be swapping cards for the rest of your life or splashing out a lot more cash.

If you're a single collector it could end costing you a whopping £773.60 to finish.

How does it work?

(Image: Fifa/Twitter)

In total there are 682 individual stickers to collect this summer, meaning you have to buy at least 137 packets to have any chance of completing the book, setting you back £109.60.

Leading mathematician Prof Paul Harper says: “However if you really are this lucky, then I might suggest that you regularly play the National Lottery.

“The 137 packets also assumes no duplicate stickers within the same packet, something Panini state is the case. In reality however, the more you collect the higher the chance of duplicates..."

Does swapping help?

(Image: PA)

Prof Harper continues: “If collectors could always swap any unwanted sticker with a wanted one at no cost, then it is pretty straightforward to see that the number of packets required for each collector is the initial lower bound calculation of 137 (£68).

“Whilst there are some helpful sticker swapping websites available (although these usually involve a handling charge plus postal costs), many collectors simply swap with school buddies in the playground or amongst friends drawn from a much smaller group of people.

“My estimates show that playing alone means 747 packets (as above); two people playing reduces the number of packets by 30%, three players by 46%, five players 57% and 10 players 68%.

"So clearly there is a great advantage to swap, as one would expect, but even with 10 friends swapping it might still cost them each £120 on average to complete their albums.

What are the chances of getting swaps?

Here's Prof Harper again: "The first sticker you buy is absolutely guaranteed not to be a duplicate.

"The second sticker you get has a 681/682 (99.85%) chance of being a new sticker.

"The third sticker you get has a 680/682 (99.7%) chance of being a new sticker, and so on."

How many in a packet?

(Image: OfficialPanini/Twitter)

The problem is slightly more complicated in that stickers come in packets of five, with each packet not containing duplicates (assuming Panini aren't so mean and true to their word).

This equation was done when packets cost 50p. They actually cost 80p now...

Our sum now becomes [(680/680) + (680/680) + (680/680) + (680/680) + (680/680) + (680/675) + (680/675) +(680/675) +(680/675) +(680/675) + (680/670) + . . . . . . . + (680/5) + (680/5) + (680/5) + (680/5) + (680/5)]

= 680 [5/680 + 5/675 + 5/670 + . . . . . . . 5/5]

= 680 [1 + 1/2 + 1/3 + . . . . .1/136]

= 680 [ln(136) + γ]

= 3,733 stickers = 747 packets = £374

On 80p his calculations showed that on average a single collector would need to buy 4,832 stickers, or 967 packets, to complete the book, costing £773.60.

Assumptions

Prof Harper added: "I have assumed that each sticker appears with the same chance in each packet (i.e. Panini produce the same amount of each and distribute them all at the same time). Maybe they hold back some special ones such as the star players?

"Also I believe you can buy boxes at cheaper prices (per packet) and I know for sure you can purchase missing stickers after the event but at inflated prices (and a limited number).

"Half the fun though is collecting them in the run up to the event."

What's the best way to do it?

The cheapest way to collect all of the stickers in Panini's 2018 World Cup album is to buy boxes of 100 packets a time, according to an avid collector.

Gary Gladwell, 50, from Romford in Essex, admitted the method may take the fun out of collecting the stickers a packet or a handful of packets at a time, but said it reduced the risk of getting so many duplicate stickers, or "swaps".

Mr Gladwell said so far he had bought two boxes of 100 packets, with each packet containing five stickers, for £70 per box and had only seven stickers left to complete the latest album, which has 682 spaces.

He said: "I can understand that to parents with young kids that want to buy it, it is very expensive now - but I do believe that Panini now aim at an older market as well as children.

"The reason I buy a box of stickers and other people buy a box of stickers is because you know that you're not going to get that many swaps."

So what happens at the end?

Prof Harper added his calculations showed that once you had only 19 stickers left to collect, a single collector would still need to buy 483 packets of stickers to complete the album.

He said: "What is interesting is that to collect just the last 19 stickers for the book, you would still be required to buy 483 packets of stickers, or half the total number of expected packets.

"Put another way, you are only half way through when you have just 19 stickers left to collect."

Or you could just send off to Panini for that final 50 at cost price....

And there's all that nostalgia

Prof Harper added: "I can still recall the joy of finally completing my first Panini album as a young boy for the 1982 World Cup in Spain.

"I must have used an awful lot of pocket money to do this, as well as having generous grandparents handing over bundles of packets of stickers, coupled with tense negotiations of swapping duplicates with friends in the school playground.

"Filling an album has become progressively more expensive over the years since then, not just because there are typically more teams competing now, but because Panini have become more creative about allocating spaces."