Romania have replaced their usual squad numbers with various maths equations in a novel attempt to promote numeracy among Romanian kids.
The country has one of the worst rates of children dropping out of school in Europe, with 18% dropping out before completing their secondary education.
President of the Romanian Football Federation, Razvan Burleanu, told the FRF website:
Football and mathematics are not mutually exclusive. Through this project, children will learn the basics of football and have an opportunity for the first time in our country – to discover mathematics through an attractive approach.
This included morphing the number on every player’s training kit into a solvable equation ahead of Romania’s friendly against Spain in Cluj over the weekend…
Thankfully, the game itself required no complex mathematics to fathom, ending goalless as it did.