House prices are falling, petrol has reached record levels and consumer confidence has plunged to a 15-year low. However, amid the financial doom and gloom, Gordon Brown is no doubt wondering whether it's possible to bottle the remarkable resilience of football fans.

Even before Manchester United and Chelsea made history by securing their places in the first all-English Champions League Final, the calculators were out, totting up exactly how much it would cost to see their team win or lose in Moscow's Luzhniki stadium.

The 42,000 travelling supporters will have to pay between £70 and £250 for a visa. With all economy flights booked up, return travel will be as much as £1,500 and with hotels quick to spot the balance of supply and demand had tipped in their favour, room rates have soared to £200 per person, per night. Add in food, drink, taxis and a suitcase jammed with hastily-bought memorabilia and the final bill has been put way in excess of £2,000.

Unsurprisingly many fans have been left open-mouthed at the cost of their support, but after bemoaning what could be the most expensive 90 minutes of their lives the vast majority have got out their credit cards and resolved to take the hit. While those who have never fallen under the spell of the beautiful game find such an outlay incomprehensible, for Prof Simon Shibli of Sheffield Hallam University's Sport Industry Research Centre it's just further evidence of the power of sport which recently caused much of Barnsley to decamp to Wembley for the team's semi-final appearance in the FA Cup.

"All our research shows that the sports sector not only grows at a faster rate than the economy, but it is also immune from wider financial fluctuations," he says. "It was once seen as a big deal that 25 per cent of consumer spending went on leisure activities, but now it's pushing 30 per cent and shows little sign of stopping.

"The cost of going to a sports match often doesn't come into it. I go to Twickenham once a year to watch the rugby and while the ticket price has risen from about £20 to £60 I would never consider not going. Watching sport is a package, there's the tickets, the travel, the drinks, the meal out and because an event like a rugby international or a Champions League Final is a one-off event, people find it easier to justify.

"Sport is habitual, it's something people commit to and because they have made personal investment during an economic downturn, people may cut back on shopping binges or weekend breaks, but sport remains."

However, despite willingly handing over hundreds, if not thousands of pounds a year, in support of our favourite teams, when it comes to actively participating in sport the vast majority of us are hopeless losers. Once school PE lessons come to an end and the obligation to be anything other than an armchair spectator is removed, New Year's resolutions become much more difficult to keep. We may love sport, but
only it seems if it's kept at a safe distance.

"Even in economically uncertain times most people these days don't really want for anything materially and in recent years we have seen a big growth in the so-called experiences industry," says Prof Shibli. "People want to have a go at rally car driving, they want to try parachuting and they are prepared to pay for it, but the general participation rate in sport is something we need
to address.

"It's a common misconception that we are lagging behind the rest of Europe. Yes, participation rates are much higher in places like Finland, but I think that's more to do with keeping warm and, in fact, compared with central European countries the UK rates don't differ that much.

"Our attitude to sport is influenced by numerous things, but often it's simply down to access to facilities. In this country, participation peaked in the 1970s, when the local authorities were reorganised.

"Knowing the entire structure of local government was going to change, existing councils began spending as much of their budgets as possible.

"Areas which had been previously neglected found they had brand new swimming pools and leisure centres on their doorsteps. However, in the recent years most of those facilities have come to the end of their natural lives and have been gradually attracting fewer and fewer members.

"It's not that we need to build a whole raft of new centres and pools, but we need to look laterally at the problem and think about opening up school pools at weekends and evenings and making opening hours in general more flexible.

"There is also hope that we will soon begin to see the long-term effect of the active schools programme to encourage youngsters to see sport as a part of their everyday lives."

However, with the SIRC's own research showing that when it comes to sport and leisure many of our cities still bear the scars from the industrial age, it will take more than a few well-meaning schemes to heal the divides.

"There are differences in take up rates in different parts of the country, but also in different parts of a city," says Prof Shibli.

"It sounds strange, but it's all to do with prevailing winds. Historically, factories were built in the eastern side of cities,
the rich tended to live in the west and they got the lion's share of amenities.

"The industry may have largely gone, but the divide still remains; you only need to look at where they are building the Olympic stadium for London 2012 to see that"

In any talk about the nation's attitude to sport, the Olympics and the Games' arrival in England in four years' time remains a contentious issues. Supporters believe the event will kickstart a whole new generation of athletes and the ripple effect will leave us all feeling better off, but with costs already spiralling doubters have not had to look far for signs of trouble ahead.

However, Prof Shibli says that remove knee-jerk reactions, hearsay and the innate British compulsion to turn any potential success story into a failure and the facts speak for themselves.

"The gestation period between getting the Games and the event itself is key," he says.

"Previous host nations have significantly improved during that time and there's a simple reason for that. Host nations throw a lot of money into specific sports and gain automatic qualification in events they wouldn't normally bother with.

"While after an Olympic Games the host nation's athletic achievements do tail off, they are still much more successful than they were before the event.

"The trick is making sure an event of this scale is sustainable. The World Student Games in Sheffield in 1991 was years ahead of its time. It was the days before National Lottery funding and yet the people decided that the city needed regenerating and that it was possible to do that by sport. It was a bold move, which required a lot of investment, but after the games finished they didn't just knock the buildings down. The long-term benefits of sport is something I think people tend to overlook."

The SIRC has recently secured a contract to look at the social, cultural and economic impact of a number of high profile events include the Great North Run and the Tour of Britain, but admits that if there is one area of sport which is positively booming, it is gambling.

Across Yorkshire and the Humber, 25 per cent of all the money we spent on sport goes on gambling and the trend appears to be increasing year
on year.

"The relaxation of the gambling laws has had a massive effect," says Prof Shibli. "People used to be content to bet on the outcome of a sporting event, but now they can bet on who will get the first goal, whether someone will equalise, how many red cards will be issued.

"While some may see the rise of gambling as a cause for concern, I think it's important to remember that it's a minority who get into trouble. For most, it's just another part of their general enjoyment of sport."

Given the money which is likely to change hands as the Premiership enters its final weeks and Manchester United hope to secure the double, it seems it will take more than the threat of a credit crunch to curb our costly love affair with sport.