Empirical evidence suggests that top players often play together in one team. Based on the "O-ring theory" (Kremer 1993) a Zidane clustering theorem is derived. It is argued that the best midfielder is most efficiently allocated when combined with an ace striker, and vice versa. This implies...

Team Tennis competitions produce aggregate scores for teams, and thus team rankings, based on head-to-head matchups of individual team members. Similar scoring rules can be used to rank any two groups that must be compared on the basis of paired elements. We explore such rules in terms of their...