Dead rubber is a term used in

sport Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, ...

ing parlance to describe a

match A match is a tool for starting a fire. Typically, matches are made of small wooden sticks or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by friction generated by striking the match against a suitable surface. Wooden matc ...

in a series where the series result has already been decided by earlier matches. The dead rubber match therefore has no effect on the winner and loser of the series, other than the total number of matches won and lost. The term is used in

Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men's tennis. It is run by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and is contested annually between teams from competing countries in a knock-out format. It is described by the orga ...

and

Billie Jean King Cup The Billie Jean King Cup (or the BJK Cup) is the premier international team competition in women's tennis, launched as the Federation Cup in 1963 Federation Cup (tennis), 1963 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the International Tennis Feder ...

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball c ...

, as well as in

international cricket International cricket matches are played between teams representing their nations, normally organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The main forms are Test matches, One-Day matches and Twenty20 matches. Most games are played ...

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shootin ...

, the

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the members of the ' (FIFA), the ...

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...

Rugby World Cup The Rugby World Cup is a men's rugby union tournament contested every four years between the top international teams. The tournament is administered by World Rugby, the sport's international governing body. The winners are awarded the Webb ...

and the

State of Origin series The State of Origin series is an annual best-of-three rugby league series between two Australian state representative sides, the New South Wales Blues and the Queensland Maroons. Referred to as “Australian sport's greatest rivalry”, the ...

. For example, in a Davis Cup series, each pair of competing countries play five matches (''rubbers'') where the winner is decided on a best-of-five basis. Once one team has reached three victories, the remaining match or matches are said to be ''dead rubbers''.

International Tennis Federation The International Tennis Federation (ITF) is the governing body of world tennis, wheelchair tennis, and beach tennis. It was founded in 1913 as the International Lawn Tennis Federation by twelve national tennis associations. As of 2016, there ...

's last revision of the competition policies on dead rubbers is from 2011. Since the result of a dead rubber has no impact in determining the winner of a series, dead rubbers are typically played in a less intense atmosphere, often allowing the team that has lost the series to obtain a match win. Sometimes, second-string players who have not played many matches in top-level competition are given the opportunity to play a dead rubber in order to gain experience. This practice makes completing a clean sweep of a series less likely.

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Badminton at 2012 Olympics
Terminology used in multiple sports Association football terminology Basketball terminology Cricket terminology Rugby league terminology Rugby union terminology Tennis terminology {{sport-stub

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