FIFA once ran a worldwide census of the game called the Big Count. How many people did it find playing football, counting both registered and casual players?
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Answer
About 265 million players
Adding referees and officials pushed the total to 270 million people, about 4 percent of the world's population at the time.
How to estimate it
The census dates from 2006, when the world held 6.5 billion people. Half were male: 3.25 billion. About half of those were of playing age, roughly 8 to 40: 1.6 billion. If 15 percent of them played at least casually, that is 240 million. Women players added about 10 percent: 240 × 1.1 = 265 million. The Big Count found 265 million players.
Source: FIFA Big Count 2006
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