Sudden Death Is the Fairest Unfair Thing in Sports
Every club player carries one of these memories. Ninety minutes of even football, a level handball cup tie, or two hours of level tennis, and then the whole evening is settled by a format: five kicks, seven points, one golden ball. Someone cries robbery, someone shrugs that rules are rules, and everyone drives home arguing about whether the better side actually won. Both camps are right, which is what makes sudden death the most interesting piece of design in amateur sports. It is ruthlessly fair in procedure and reliably unfair in outcome, and the gap between those two things can be computed.