England’s first penalty shootout victory is cost the UK economy £202 million in sickies

After a historical game against Colombia, England has made it through to the quarter finals of the World Cup for the first time in 12 years, but how did the nation celebrate and watch one of the most momentous occasions in UK football history? And what did the sore heads costing the country’s economy?

William Hill has carried out research of 2000 UK adults to find out how the country watches and celebrates the World Cup, from the total pints sunk on Tuesday to the number of people who skived off work yesterday.

Celebrating and commiserating: after the game

Already anticipating a post-celebration hangover – an estimated 1.2 million England fans planned to call in sick, with 1.1 million having already pulled a sickie after previous World Cup games in 2014.

Office of National Statistics figures illustrate that the working population earns £168.83 per person per day, so due to the unusually high number of sick days taken yesterday, data suggests the UK economy lost a total of £202 million from hazy heads.

A further 8% freely admitted that they had already planned to leave work early yesterday, and 4% had already booked the day off after the quarter final qualifier.

Men are more likely to consider bunking off, with 5% of all male respondents hoping their bosses would be sympathetic, compared with just 2% of women.

Despite work the next day a positive 18% did say they would carry on drinking wherever they watch the game, and a (romantic?) 5% said that in the event of an England win they would have sex to commend the achievement.

Gearing up for Tuesday's game

Despite the ever-increasing price of kits, 2.6 million fans will have bought the new England shirt. 15% of people watching around the country chose to don a retro shirt, with kits from previous tournaments often fetching over £100 on auction sites. Although Royal Mail has banned car flags on its vehicles, 2.7 million people are flying them from their vehicles windows, and 1.4 million supporters were wearing the cross of St George as face-paint during Tuesdays game.

A total of 4.4 million people also had a flutter in a social sweepstake (statistically 137,500 will have drawn England).

The game in numbers: 90 minutes around England

When it comes to watching the England game, 34% of people viewed it at home and 21% were in the pub.

Harry Kane has scored the most goals per minute at the tournament so far, and the figures show that England fans have been celebrating with the talisman. Last night it is estimated that 15 million people enjoyed a pint, while 4.6 million were sharing their thoughts on social media and 10.8 million were shouting at their TVs.

For all the essential stats on what goes on around the country before, during and after an England game at the World Cup, check out William Hill's full research.