I can really pick ’em. Losing causes that is. I’ve made a career out of it. But there is no losing cause quite like this one - defending football players’ wages.

The last time I took part in the debate was when the Sports Minister attacked John Terry’s wages. On that occasion, I simply explained the economic theory. It’s all to do with the ability to share enjoyment.

An apple is eaten by Person A and Person B can’t enjoy it at all. Each apple sells for roughly the same small amount. A football player’s talent is different. Person A watches and Person B can watch, too. Nobody spoils anybody else’s enjoyment. The result is that the same few big players are shared. They pick up little bits of money from lots of people. It adds up to a tidy sum.

But this is all, as I say, theory. What about the hard numbers? Does Terry really and truly justify a multimillion-pound salary?

This week, Dr Ian Graham and Dr Henry Stott have worked with me on a rather playful Fink Tank. What we have been looking at is whether Terry’s salary is in the right bracket. We’re trying to give you a feel for the numbers, not just with Terry but for other superstars, too. We can’t do better than that because so many of the figures I am about to give you are pretty wild estimates.

Our first step was to look at the sort of money that Chelsea get from television and prize-money. The amounts are heavily dependent on the position Chelsea finish in the Barclays Premier League. So, for instance, TV money depends on the numbers of appearances on the box and this in turn depends on how well you do. We modelled this to produce an estimate of TV appearances and TV money in different circumstances.

The next step was to make an estimate of total Premier League revenue to the club from so-called merit money and basic money. This involves multiplying the amount Chelsea might get if they finished in a given position by the probability they will finish in that position. You can then do this for the Champions League and the FA Cup, the former being critically important to the financial situation, the latter pretty irrelevant.

Doing all this gives you an estimate of £162 million of revenue in a season. And all this with Terry playing, as he did last season, in 70 per cent of games. What if he had not been there?

Our player ranking uses every touch of the ball to assess the contribution of each player. Modelling allows us to compare a team with a particular player with the same team with an average player in the same position.

For many, it does not make a big difference. But for Terry? It’s huge. He greatly increases Chelsea’s strength, by as much as 30 per cent compared with (remember) an average player.

Now we can redo all the calculations on revenue using the average player. So, for instance, Chelsea’s chance of not making the Champions League goes up and expected revenue goes down. Without Terry, it is £11 million less.

We are told that an average Premier League player is paid £1 million, while Terry is paid something like £6 million. This means that Chelsea are £6 million better off with the highly paid defender than without him.

He’s worth his wages, even before marketing revenue comes into the picture. There you go, minister.

Chelsea's expected earnings from competition and television

finktank@thetimes.co.uk

Fink Tank research is fuelled by Lucozade Sport