First there was the South Sea Bubble. Then the Panama Canal crash, followed by the Wall Street boom and bust of the Roaring Twenties. More recently, there has been the dotcom delirium, and now the US subprime extravaganza.

But even before the latest banking bubble has fully burst, there are signs of a new madness taking hold of sports companies as they try to outbid each other for the rights to kit out national soccer teams.