You can also assign two pairs of corners that are diagonally opposite members of a team. There are three ways to form teams using this strategy. (See above.)
Finally, you can choose two teams as shown below.
Mathematicians can prove that this particular set of seven ways of choosing teams will guarantee that each player, over seven games, will play with every other player exactly three times.
The trouble is that this method works only for eight players. For any other number of players, random selection may be simplest and most convenient. And the more games you play, the better that team selection will work out.
Ivars Peterson is a freelance writer, blogger, and author ofThe MathematicalTourist. He usually didn’t resort to math when he was helping coach his son’s soccer team, but there’s plenty of geometry in the way the game is played.
本文刊登在《英语沙龙》（原版阅读）
2023年4月刊
责任编辑：绯银
