A tournament is a
competition
Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero-sum game). Competition can arise between entities such as organisms, indivi ...
involving at least three competitors, all participating in a
sport
Sport pertains to any form of Competition, competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and Skill, skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to specta ...
or
game
A game is a structured form of play (activity), play, usually undertaken for enjoyment, entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator s ...
. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
# One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentrated into a relatively short time interval.
# A competition involving a number of matches, each involving a subset of the competitors, with the overall tournament winner determined based on the combined results of these individual matches. These are common in those sports and games where each match must involve a small number of competitors: often precisely two, as in most
team sport
A team sport includes any sport where individuals are organized into opposing sports team, teams which compete to win or cooperate to entertain their audience. Team members act together towards a shared objective. This can be done in a numb ...
s,
racket sport
Racket sports are games in which players use a racket or paddle to hit a ball or other object. Rackets consist of a handled frame with an open hoop that supports a network of tightly stretched strings. Paddles have a solid face rather than a ne ...
s and
combat sport
A combat sport, or fighting sport, is a competitive contact sport that usually involves one-on-one combat. In many combat sports, a contestant wins by scoring more points than the opponent, submitting the opponent with a hold, disabling the oppon ...
s, many
card game
A card game is any game using playing cards as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific.
Countless card games exist, including families of related games (such as poker). A small number of card ...
s and
board game
Board games are tabletop games that typically use . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well.
Many board games feature a comp ...
s, and many forms of
competitive debating
Debate is a process that involves formal discourse on a particular topic, often including a Discussion moderator, moderator and audience. In a debate, arguments are put forward for often opposing viewpoints. Debates have historically occurred ...
. Such tournaments allow large numbers to compete against each other in spite of the restriction on numbers in a single match.
These two senses are distinct. All
golf tournament
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...
s meet the first definition, but while
match play
Match play is a scoring system for golf in which a player, or team, earns a point for each hole in which they have bested their opponents; as opposed to stroke play, in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 h ...
tournaments meet the second,
stroke play
Stroke play, also known as medal play, is a scoring system in the sport of golf in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 holes. In stroke play, the winner is the player who has taken the fewest strokes over the ...
tournaments do not, since there are no distinct matches within the tournament. In contrast,
association football
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
leagues like the
Premier League
The Premier League (legal name: The Football Association Premier League Limited) is the highest level of the men's English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Foo ...
are tournaments in the second sense, but not the first, having matches spread across many venues over a period of up to a season. Many tournaments meet both definitions; for example, the
Wimbledon tennis championship. Tournaments "are temporally demarcated events, participation in which confers levels of status and prestige amongst all participating members".
A tournament-match (or ''tie'' or ''fixture'' or ''heat'') may involve multiple game-matches (or ''rubbers'' or ''legs'') between the competitors. For example, in the
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 organis ...
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 ...
tournament, a tie between two nations involves five rubbers between the nations' players. The team that wins the most rubbers wins the tie. In the later rounds of
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 competit ...
, each fixture is
played over two legs. The scores of each leg are added, and the team with the higher aggregate score wins the fixture, with a
penalty shoot-out
The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pen ...
used if the scores are level after both matches conclude.
Knockout tournaments
A knockout tournament or elimination tournament is divided into successive rounds; each
competitor
Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero-sum game). Competition can arise between entities such as organisms, indivi ...
plays in at least one fixture per round. The top-ranked competitors in each fixture progress to the next round. As rounds progress, the number of competitors and fixtures decreases. The final round, usually known as the final or cup final, consists of just one fixture; the winner of which is the overall champion.
![SixteenPlayerSingleEliminationTournamentBracket](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/90/SixteenPlayerSingleEliminationTournamentBracket.svg)
In a
single-elimination tournament
A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...
, only the top-ranked competitors in a fixture progress; in 2-competitor games, only the winner progresses. All other competitors are eliminated. This ensures a winner is decided with the minimum number of fixtures. However, most competitors will be eliminated after relatively few matches; a single bad or unlucky performance can nullify many preceding excellent ones.
A
double-elimination tournament
A double-elimination tournament is a type of elimination tournament competition in which a participant ceases to be eligible to win the tournament's championship upon having lost ''two'' games or matches. It stands in contrast to a single-elimina ...
may be used in 2-competitor games to allow each competitor a single loss without being eliminated from the tournament. All losers from the main
bracket
A bracket is either of two tall fore- or back-facing punctuation marks commonly used to isolate a segment of text or data from its surroundings. Typically deployed in symmetric pairs, an individual bracket may be identified as a 'left' or 'r ...
enter a losers' bracket, the winner of which plays off against the main bracket's winner.
A triple-elimination tournament allows a competitor to lose two games and creates a third bracket or fourth bracket which are usually followed by a playoff. It is usually used in
curling
Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area which is segmented into four concentric circles. It is related to bowls, boules, and shuffleboard. Two teams, each with four players, take turns sliding ...
tournaments.
Some elimination tournaments are in a
best-of-''n'' series, requiring a competitor to lose a majority of ''n'' games (in a series against the same opponent) before being eliminated (e.g. in a best-of-7 games series, the winner must win 4 games).
Some formats use a
repechage
Repechage (; french: repêchage, "fishing out, rescuing") is a practice in series competitions that allows participants who failed to meet qualifying standards by a small margin to continue to the next round. A well known example is the wild car ...
, allowing losers to play extra rounds before re-entering the main competition in a later round.
Rowing
Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically atta ...
regatta
Boat racing is a sport in which boats, or other types of watercraft, race on water. Boat racing powered by oars is recorded as having occurred in ancient Egypt, and it is likely that people have engaged in races involving boats and other wate ...
s often have repechage rounds for the "fastest loser" from the heats. The winners of these progress, but are at a disadvantage in later rounds owing to the extra effort expended during the repechage.
A
family of tournament systems that grew from a system devised for the Victorian Football League, the historic predecessor to the
Australian Football League
The Australian Football League (AFL) is the only fully professional competition of Australian rules football. Through the AFL Commission, the AFL also serves as the sport's governing body and is responsible for controlling the laws of the gam ...
(AFL), allow the teams with the best record before the playoffs to lose a game without being eliminated, whereas lesser qualifiers are not. Several of the most prominent leagues in Australia use such a system, such as the AFL and the
National Rugby League
The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...
in rugby league. The
A-League
A-League Men (known as the Isuzu UTE A-League for sponsorship reasons) is the highest-level professional men's soccer league in Australia and New Zealand. At the top of the Australian league system, it is the country's premier men's competiti ...
of association football also used such a system through its 2011–12 season, but now uses a pure knockout playoff. Similar systems are used in cricket's
Indian Premier League
The Indian Premier League (IPL), also known as TATA IPL for sponsorship reasons, is a men's T20 franchise cricket league of India. It is annually contested by ten teams based out of seven Indian cities and three Indian states. The leagu ...
and most
curling
Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area which is segmented into four concentric circles. It is related to bowls, boules, and shuffleboard. Two teams, each with four players, take turns sliding ...
tournaments, and were also used by the
Super League
The Super League (officially known as the Betfred Super League due to sponsorship from Betfred and legally known as Super League Europe), is the top-level of the British rugby league system. At present the league consists of twelve teams, of wh ...
of European rugby league before being scrapped after the 2014 season.
In
athletics
Athletics may refer to:
Sports
* Sport of athletics, a collection of sporting events that involve competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking
** Track and field, a sub-category of the above sport
* Athletics (physical culture), competiti ...
meetings, fastest losers may progress in a running event held over several rounds; e.g. the qualifiers for a later round might be the first 4 from each of 6 heats, plus the 8 fastest losers from among the remaining runners.
An extreme form of the knockout tournament is the stepladder format where the strongest team (or individual, depending on the sport) is assured of a berth at the final round while the next strongest teams are given byes according to their strength/seeds; for example, in a four team tournament, the fourth and third seed figure in the first round, then the winner goes to the semifinals against the second seed, while the survivor faces the first seed at the final. Four American sports organizations either currently use this format, or have in the past:
* Since the mid-1960s, most
ten-pin bowling
Ten-pin bowling is a type of bowling in which a bowler rolls a bowling ball down a wood or synthetic lane toward ten pins positioned evenly in four rows in an equilateral triangle. The objective is to knock down all ten pins on the first roll ...
events use a stepladder final, usually involving five bowlers.
* Two U.S. college conferences operate a tournament format in basketball that combines two stepladder tournaments into one—that is, both halves of the bracket are organized as stepladder tournaments. When eight teams are involved in the tournament, the bottom four teams play in the first round; the survivors will face the #3 and #4 seeds, and the winners of those matches take on the top two seeds in the semifinals. This format was used by the
West Coast Conference
The West Coast Conference (WCC) — known as the California Basketball Association from 1952 to 1956 and then as the West Coast Athletic Conference until 1989 — is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I consisting of ...
(WCC) for its men's and women's tournaments from 2003 through 2013, and has been used by the
Ohio Valley Conference
The Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference which operates in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern and Southeastern United States, Southeastern United States. It participates in NCAA Divisi ...
(OVC) for men since 2011 and women from 2011 through 2014. From 2019 forward, the WCC tournaments will return to the aforementioned format, but add an extra round so that all 10 current conference members will participate (note that the OVC tournament does not involve all of the league's members, currently 12).
* In the Philippines, the
UAAP Basketball Championship
The UAAP Basketball Championship holds its basketball tournaments from September to December. Basketball is a mandatory sport in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP). All eight universities participate in the Men's, Women ...
and the
NCAA Basketball Championship both use the stepladder format if a team wins all elimination round (group stage) games. This format has been adopted to other sports in both leagues, and to other leagues. If no team wins all elimination round games, the playoffs remain in the usual two-round playoff format.
* The now-defunct
Women's Professional Soccer
Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) was the top-level professional women's soccer league in the United States. It began play on March 29, 2009. The league was composed of seven teams for its first two seasons and fielded six teams for the 2011 sea ...
used this format in all of its three seasons of existence. For an example of its playoff system, see
2009 Women's Professional Soccer Playoffs The 2009 WPS Playoffs were the postseason to Women's Professional Soccer's 2009 Season, that started on August 15 and culminated on August 22 at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California.
Format
The top four WPS teams, based on their regular sea ...
.
Group tournaments
A group tournament,
league
League or The League may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band
* ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football
Sports
* Sports league
* Rugby league, full contact footba ...
,
division
Division or divider may refer to:
Mathematics
*Division (mathematics), the inverse of multiplication
*Division algorithm, a method for computing the result of mathematical division
Military
*Division (military), a formation typically consisting ...
or
conference
A conference is a meeting of two or more experts to discuss and exchange opinions or new information about a particular topic.
Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always decisions, are the main p ...
involves all competitors playing a number of ''fixtures'' (again, a fixture is one name for a tournament-match that determines who, out of two or three or more, will advance; a fixture may consist of one or more game-matches between competitors). Points are awarded for each fixture, with competitors ranked based either on total number of points or average points per fixture. Usually each competitor plays an equal number of fixtures, in which case rankings by total points and by average points are equivalent. The English
County Championship
The County Championship (referred to as the LV= Insurance County Championship for sponsorship reasons) is the domestic first-class cricket competition in England and Wales and is organised by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). It bec ...
in cricket did not require an equal number of matches prior to 1963.
![Round-robin tournament_10teams_en](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b7/Round-robin_tournament_10teams_en.png)
In a
round-robin tournament
A round-robin tournament (or all-go-away-tournament) is a competition
Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero ...
, each competitor plays all the others an equal number of times, once in a single round-robin tournament and twice in a double round-robin tournament. This is often seen as producing the most reliable rankings. However, for large numbers of competitors it may require an unfeasibly large number of rounds. A
Swiss system tournament
A Swiss-system tournament is a non-eliminating tournament format that features a fixed number of rounds of competition, but considerably fewer than for a round-robin tournament; thus each competitor (team or individual) does not play all the other ...
attempts to determine a winner reliably, based on a smaller number of fixtures. Unlike regular Groups format, fixtures are scheduled one round at a time and depending on the results of the previous one; a competitor will play another who has a similar record in previous rounds of the tournament. This allows the top (and bottom) competitors to be determined with fewer rounds than a round-robin, though the middle rankings are unreliable.
For clarification, this means in hypothesis
UEFA
Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs f ...
adopts a Swiss System for
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 competit ...
, the second matchday in the first stage (today's Groups Stage) would depend on the results of the first matchday of the same stage, the third matchday would depend on the results of both the first and the second matchday, and so on, in contrast to the predetermination of all Groups Stage fixtures upon the initial draw.
Another tournament system that attempts to reduce the number of fixtures per competitor is the Pot System. Under that system, competitors are divided to different "pots" based on predetermined ranking and are drawn to play one rival from each pot, including their own pot. For example, in a 36-team World Cup, teams would be divided into 3 pots, with each team playing 3 matches - one against a Pot A team, one against Pot B team, and one against a team from Pot C. All teams are then placed in one general standing the defines qualification to the following stage.
There may be other considerations besides reliability of rankings. In some
professional
A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and skil ...
team sports, weaker teams are given an easier slate of fixtures as a form of
handicapping
Handicapping, in sport and games, is the practice of assigning advantage through scoring compensation or other advantage given to different contestants to equalize the chances of winning. The word also applies to the various methods by which th ...
. Sometimes schedules are weighted in favour of
local derbies or other
traditional rivalries. For example, NFL teams play two games against each of the other three teams in their division, one game against six of the other twelve teams in their conference, and one game against five of the sixteen teams in the other conference.
American sports are also unusual in providing fixtures between competitors who are, for ranking purposes, in different groups. Another, systematic, example of this was the
2006 Women's Rugby World Cup
The 2006 Women's Rugby World Cup (officially IRB Rugby World Cup 2006 Canada) took place in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The tournament began on 31 August and ended on 17 September 2006. The 2006 tournament was the third World Cup approved by the I ...
: each of the teams in Group A played each of the teams in Group B, with the groups ranked separately based on the results. (Groups C and D intertwined similarly.) An elaboration of this system is the Mitchell movement in duplicate bridge, discussed
below
Below may refer to:
*Earth
*Ground (disambiguation)
*Soil
*Floor
*Bottom (disambiguation)
Bottom may refer to:
Anatomy and sex
* Bottom (BDSM), the partner in a BDSM who takes the passive, receiving, or obedient role, to that of the top or ...
, where north–south pairs play east–west pairs.
In 2-competitor games where
ties are rare or impossible, competitors are typically ranked by number of wins, with ties counting half; each competitors' listings are usually ordered Wins–Losses(–Ties). Where ties are more common, this may be 2 points for a win and 1 for a tie, which is mathematically equivalent but avoids having too many half-points in the listings, or
3 points for a win and 1 for a tie, which de-emphasizes ties in favor of playing to a decisive result. These are usually ordered Wins–Ties–Losses. If there are more than two competitors per fixture, points may be ordinal (for example, 3 for first, 2 for second, 1 for third).
Multi-stage tournaments
Many tournaments are held in multiple stages, with the top teams in one stage progressing to the next. American professional team sports have a "regular season" (group tournament) acting as qualification for the "post season" or "
playoffs
The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...
" (single-elimination tournament). A group stage (also known as pool play or the pool stage) is a
round-robin stage in a multi-stage tournament. The competitors are divided into multiple groups, which play separate round-robins in parallel. Measured by a
points-based ranking system, the top competitors in each group qualify for the next stage. In most editions of the
FIFA World Cup
The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the ' ( FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The tournament ha ...
finals tournament, the first round has been a group stage with groups of four teams, the top two qualifying for the "knockout stage" played as a
single-elimination tournament
A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...
. This format is common in many international team events, such as
World Cup
A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...
s or
Olympic
Olympic or Olympics may refer to
Sports
Competitions
* Olympic Games, international multi-sport event held since 1896
** Summer Olympic Games
** Winter Olympic Games
* Ancient Olympic Games, ancient multi-sport event held in Olympia, Greece b ...
tournaments. Some tournaments have two group stages, for example the
1982 FIFA World Cup
The 1982 FIFA World Cup was the 12th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial Association football, football tournament for men's senior national teams, and was played in Spain between 13 June and 11 July 1982. The tournament was won by Italy national foo ...
or the
1999–2000 UEFA Champions League
The 1999–2000 UEFA Champions League was the 45th season of the UEFA Champions League, UEFA's premier European club football tournament, and the eighth season since its rebranding from the "European Champion Clubs' Cup" or "European Cup". The com ...
. As well as a fixed number of qualifiers from each group, some may be determined by comparing between different groups: at the
1986 FIFA World Cup
The 1986 FIFA World Cup was the 13th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams. It was played in Mexico from 31 May to 29 June 1986. The tournament was the second to feature a 24-team format. Colombia ha ...
and
UEFA Euro 2016
The 2016 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2016 (stylised as UEFA EURO 2016) or simply Euro 2016, was the 15th UEFA European Championship, the quadrennial international men's football championship of Europe o ...
, the best four of six third-place sides qualified; at the
1999 Rugby World Cup
The 1999 Rugby World Cup was the fourth Rugby World Cup, the quadrennial international rugby union championship. It was principally hosted by Wales, and was won by Australia. This was the first Rugby World Cup to be held in the sport's professi ...
the best one of five third-place sides did so.
Sometimes, results from an earlier phase are carried over into a later phase. In the
Cricket World Cup
The Cricket World Cup (officially known as ICC Men's Cricket World Cup) is the international championship of One Day International (ODI) cricket. The event is organised by the sport's governing body, the International Cricket Council (ICC), e ...
, the second stage, known as the Super Eight since
2007
File:2007 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Steve Jobs unveils Apple's first iPhone; TAM Airlines Flight 3054 overruns a runway and crashes into a gas station, killing almost 200 people; Former Pakistani Prime Minister of Pakistan, Pr ...
and before that the Super Six, features two teams from each of four preliminary groups (previously three teams from two preliminary groups), who do not replay the teams they have already played, but instead reuse the original results in the new league table. Formerly in the
Swiss Football League
The Swiss football league system, is a series of interconnected leagues for association football clubs in Switzerland, with seven teams from Liechtenstein, and one each from exclaves of Germany and Italy, also competing. The system has a hierarchi ...
, teams played a double round-robin, at which point they were split into a top "championship" group and a bottom "relegation" group; each played a separate double round-robin, with results of all 32 matches counting for ranking each group. A similar system is also used by the
Scottish Premiership
The Scottish Premiership, known as the cinch Premiership for sponsorship reasons, is the top division of the Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL), the league competition for men's professional football clubs in Scotland. The Scottish ...
and its historic predecessor, the
Scottish Premier League
The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the top level league competition for professional football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football' ...
, since 2000. After 33 games, when every club has played every other club three times, the division is split into two halves. Clubs play a further five matches, against the teams in their half of the division. This can (and often does) result in the team placed seventh having a higher points total than the team placed sixth (because their final five games are considerably easier), nevertheless, a team in the bottom half never receives a higher final ranking than a team which qualified for the top half.
A multi-stage pool system was implemented by
Curling Canada
Curling Canada (formerly the Canadian Curling Association (CCA)) is a sanctioning body for the sport of Curling in Canada. It is associated with more than a dozen provincial and territorial curling associations across the country, and organizes C ...
for the Canadian championship curling tournaments (the
Scotties Tournament of Hearts
The Scotties Tournament of Hearts (''french: Le Tournoi des Cœurs Scotties''; commonly referred to as the Scotties) is the annual Canadian women's curling championship, sanctioned by Curling Canada, formerly called the Canadian Curling Associat ...
for women and the
Tim Hortons Brier
The Tim Hortons Brier, or simply (and more commonly) the Brier (''french: Le Brier''), is the annual Canadian men's curling championship, sanctioned by Curling Canada. The current event name refers to its main sponsor, the Tim Hortons coffee and ...
for men) starting in 2018. The change was intended to allow the expansion of the main stage of the tournament from twelve to sixteen teams while keeping the round robin at eleven games. The teams are seeded using
a ranking system in which points are calculated based on the teams' results in all competitive
bonspiel
A bonspiel is a curling tournament, consisting of several games, often held on a weekend. Until the 20th century most bonspiels were held outdoors, on a frozen freshwater loch. Today almost all bonspiels are held indoors on specially prepared ar ...
s using a complicated formula. Seeds 1, 4, 5, 8, 9, 12, 13 and 16 and placed in Pool A while seeds 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14 and 15 are placed in Pool B. After each team has played seven games, the top four teams from each pool advance to the "Championship Pool." Carrying over their entire round robin records with them, Championship Pool teams play one game against each of the four teams in the opposite pool, with the top four teams qualifying for the
page playoffs
The Page playoff system is a playoff format used primarily in softball and curling at the championship level, the Indian Premier League and Pakistan Super League cricket tournaments. Teams are Single-elimination tournament#Seeding, seeded using a ...
. In contrast, teams that fail to qualify for the Championship Pool play only one additional "Placement Round" game against the team that finished in the same position in the opposite pool for the purposes of determining final tournament ranking. For these teams, there is little else to play for since there is no form of relegation (and, with the expansion of the field to sixteen teams, no "Pre-Qualifying Tournament") and seeding is based solely on the performances of the participating teams and not the past results of the provinces and territories they represent.
The
top Slovenian basketball league has a unique system. In its first phase, 12 of the league's 13 clubs compete in a full home-and-away season, with the country's representative in the
Euroleague (an elite pan-European club competition) exempt. The league then splits. The top seven teams are joined by the Euroleague representative for a second home-and-away season, with no results carrying over from the first phase. These eight teams compete for four spots in a final playoff. The bottom five teams play their own home-and-away league, but their previous results ''do'' carry over. These teams are competing to avoid relegation, with the bottom team automatically relegated and the second-from-bottom team forced to play a mini-league with the second- and third-place teams from the second level for a place in the top league.
Evaluation of the current multi-stage tournaments
In many international team events, such as World Cups or Olympic tournaments, different variants of the combination of the group stage (round-robin tournament) and the knockout stage (single-elimination tournament) are used. Such tournaments have significant structural problems that lead, among other things, to the violation of fair play. The following classification of these problems, with examples from football championships, applies in principle to tournaments in all other sports.
1. In the group stage, it often happens that some teams have already reached the knockout stage after two match days or can no longer qualify for the knockout stage. Consequently, the result of the last group match has no meaning for these teams.
If two such teams meet in the last group match, then it will not have a major tournament impact. It is just a training match with no relevance to the championship. However, such meaningless matches are not always advantageous for the already qualified teams. The game rhythm is lost and the team may have difficulties finding it in the next game.
Current examples from the last FIFA World Cup or UEFA European Championship:
* Egypt - Saudi Arabia (World Cup 2018)
* Panama - Tunisia (World Cup 2018)
* Netherlands - North Macedonia (Euro 2020)
2. More problematic are the constellations in which the game has no meaning for only one team. The lack of motivation of this team can influence the result of the match and thus lead to unfair competition.
In other problematic constellations, it is possible that a certain result is enough for both teams to qualify for the final stage regardless of the other group match.
The best-known examples of these types of constellations:
* Argentina - Peru (World Cup 1978)
* Germany - Austria (World Cup 1982)
* Sweden - Denmark (Euro 2004)
Current examples:
* Spain - Morocco (World Cup 2018)
* France - Denmark (World Cup 2018)
* Australia - Peru (World Cup 2018)
* Switzerland - Costa Rica (World Cup 2018)
* Poland - Japan (World Cup 2018)
* Italy - Wales (Euro 2020)
* Belgium - Finland (Euro 2020)
* Netherlands - Qatar (World Cup 2022)
* Morocco - Canada (World Cup 2022)
* Spain - Japan (World Cup 2022)
In such "fair play potentially problematic" constellations, the violation of fair play in one way or another is possible and not excluded by the rules of the tournament format. In most cases, even in these constellations, the matches are played according to fair play and there are no repercussions for the other teams in the group. Nevertheless, this possibility exists, which can lead to irritations around the matches. Sometimes, in these cases, the teams concerned even feel compelled to assure that no arrangements are made, as was the case at the 2014 World Cup before the final group match between Germany and the USA.
3. In another type of constellations, the already qualified teams can still have a supposed aim in the third group match: first place in the group. But the possible first opponent in the knockout stage is known only for the teams whose third match will take place after the matches in the parallel groups. The opponents in the possible further course of the knockout stage are also difficult to estimate. Therefore, in many cases, there is no reason to win the third match at all costs and become the group winner. Such matches function more as a kind of additional draw. The result has no sporting significance for the teams concerned, so these matches are meaningless and may lead to "fair play problematic" constellations.
Current examples:
* Russia - Uruguay (World Cup 2018)
* France - Denmark (World Cup 2018)
* Croatia - Iceland (World Cup 2018)
* Belgium - England (World Cup 2018)
* Italy - Wales (Euro 2020)
* Belgium - Finland (Euro 2020)
* England - Czech Republic (Euro 2020)
* Sweden - Poland (Euro 2020)
* France - Portugal (Euro 2020)
* France - Tunisia (World Cup 2022)
* Brazil - Cameroon (World Cup 2022)
* Portugal - South Korea (World Cup 2022)
4. In some cases, however, there might be a motivation for teams to finish first in their group, especially if a top favorite is waiting for the group runner-up. If, however, the top favorite surprisingly finished second in its group and now faces the group winner, then it will be an advantage to finish second. According to the tournament format, winning in this case paradoxically reduces the chances of advancing. This was particularly illustrated in the scandal at the 2012 Olympic badminton tournament. Several participants in the badminton tournament were disqualified because they had tried to get easier competitors or a better starting position for the final stage by losing. Sometimes neither of the participants was really willing to leave the field as the winner. The championships of all sports are not immune to such constellations.
5. Another general problem of the group stage could be observed at the 2018 World Cup. If two or more teams are equal based on the results criteria (number of points, goal difference, etc.), their ranking is determined according to other criteria. In Group H, Senegal was eliminated from the knockout stage only because the team conceded two more yellow cards than Japan.
6. In the knockout stage, the format single-elimination tournament is used. This format is most efficient to determine the winner quickly with the smallest possible number of matches. And it is the most ineffective to determine the actual best team as the winner with the highest possible probability. The poor performance of the single-elimination tournament can be explained by the fact that a team is eliminated from the tournament after a single defeat. Even the best team can occasionally lose, for example in a penalty shoot-out. In addition, the stronger teams can meet in the earlier rounds and eliminate each other from the tournament. Thus, the number of "better" teams is reduced and "weaker" teams get more chances to become tournament winner.
7. The results in the group stage and in the earlier rounds of the knockout stage are not taken into account in any way. This leads to paradoxical effects and non-transparent final rankings. For example, at the 2020 European Championship, Denmark reached the semifinals with a total of three losses, while Belgium, after winning all of its first four games (including against Denmark), was already eliminated in the quarterfinals after its only loss against eventual champions Italy.
8. The proportion of matches between the best teams is too small compared to the total number of matches. For example, in the World Cup there are 64 matches in total. 57 matches of them are played in the group stage (including several meaningless and "fair play problematic" ones), in the round of 16 and for the insignificant third place. Only seven matches are reserved for the exciting and high-class encounters between eight last teams fighting for the championship title.
9. There are no positive prospects for future World Cups. FIFA is planning the 2026 World Cup with 48 teams. In the group phase, 16 groups of 3 teams each are to be formed, followed by the knockout stage with 32 participants. In the groups with three participants, "fair-play problematic" constellations and meaningless matches are also possible. And in the case of the single-elimination tournament with 32 teams, the determination of the world champion is influenced even more by random factors.
Promotion and relegation
Where the number of competitors is larger than a tournament format permits, there may be multiple tournaments held in parallel, with competitors assigned to a particular tournament based on their ranking. In
Chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...
,
Scrabble
''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left t ...
, and many other individual games, many tournaments over one or more years contribute to a player's ranking. However, many team sports involve teams in only one major tournament per year. In European sport, including football, this constitutes the sole ranking for the following season; the top teams from each division of the league are promoted to a higher division, while the bottom teams from a higher division are relegated to a lower one.
This promotion and relegation occurs mainly in league tournaments, but also features in Davis Cup and Fed Cup tennis:
* In the Davis Cup:
** The first-round losers in the top-level World Group compete in playoff ties against the winners of the second-round ties in Group I of the competition's three regional zones, with the winners of each playoff tie remaining in or promoted to the World Group.
** In the three regional zones, Group II is conducted in a knockout format. The winner of the knockout tournament is promoted to Group I of its zone. The first-round losers then play relegation ties, with the losers relegated to Group III.
** Groups III and IV in each zone are contested in a round-robin format. The top two teams in each group are promoted, while the bottom two teams are relegated (assuming there is a lower group in their zone).
* In the Fed Cup:
** The four first-round losers in World Group I compete in playoff ties against the four winners in World Group II, with the winners remaining in or promoted to World Group I.
** The losers in World Group II play ties against the four zonal Group I winners (two from Europe/Africa and one each from Asia/Oceania and Americas), with the winners playing in World Group II the following season.
** Groups I and II in all zones, plus Group III in the Europe/Africa Zone only, are conducted in a round-robin format. The bottom two teams in each group are relegated to the next group down, assuming one exists, while the top two teams in Groups II and III are promoted to the next-higher group.
The hierarchy of divisions may be linear, or tree-like, as with the
English football league pyramid.
Bridge tournaments
In
contract bridge
Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions o ...
a "tournament" is a tournament in the first sense above, composed of multiple "events", which are tournaments in the second sense. Some events may be single-elimination, double-elimination, or Swiss style. However, "
Pair events" are the most widespread. In these events, a number of deals (or ''
board
Board or Boards may refer to:
Flat surface
* Lumber, or other rigid material, milled or sawn flat
** Plank (wood)
** Cutting board
** Sounding board, of a musical instrument
* Cardboard (paper product)
* Paperboard
* Fiberboard
** Hardboard, a ty ...
s'') are each played several times by different players. For each such board the score achieved by each north–south (NS) pair is then measured against all the other NS pairs playing the same board. Thus pairs are rewarded for playing the same cards better than others have played them. There is a predetermined schedule of fixtures depending on the number of pairs and boards to be played, to ensure a good mix of opponents, and that no pair plays the same board or the same opponents twice (see
duplicate bridge movements
A duplicate bridge movement is a scheme used in a duplicate bridge session to arrange which competitors play which opponents when, and which boards they play. The arrangement has to satisfy various constraints which often conflict to some extent, ...
).
Poker tournaments
In
poker tournament
A poker tournament is a tournament where players compete by playing poker. It can feature as few as two players playing on a single table (called a "heads up poker, heads-up" tournament), and as many as tens of thousands of players playing on th ...
s, as players are eliminated, the number of tables is gradually reduced, with the remaining players redistributed among the remaining tables. Play continues until one player has won all of the chips in play. Finishing order is determined by the order in which players are eliminated: last player remaining gets first place, last player eliminated gets second, previous player eliminated gets third, etc.
In a "shootout" tournament, players do not change tables until every table has been reduced to one player.
Alternatives to tournament systems
While tournament structures attempt to provide an objective format for determining the best competitor in a game or sport, other methods exist.
;
Challenge: In this format, champions retain their title until they are defeated by an opponent, known as the ''challenger''. This system is used in
professional boxing
Professional boxing, or prizefighting, is regulated, sanctioned boxing. Professional boxing bouts are fought for a purse bid, purse that is divided between the boxers as determined by contract. Most professional bouts are supervised by a regula ...
(see
lineal championship
In combat sports where champions are decided by a challenge, the lineal championship of a weight class is a world championship title held initially by an undisputed champion and subsequently by a fighter who defeats the reigning champion in a mat ...
), and the
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the world champion in chess. The current world champion is Magnus Carlsen of Norway, who has held the title since 2013.
The first event recognized as a world championship was the World Chess ...
. The right to become a contender may be awarded through a tournament, as in chess, or through a ranking system: the ranking systems used by boxing's governing bodies are controversial and opaque. If the champion retires or dies, then the current top challenger may be declared champion or the title may be vacant until a match between two challengers is held. Prior to 1920, the reigning Wimbledon champion received a bye to the final; the official name of the
FA Challenge Cup
The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in men's domestic Football in England, English football. First played d ...
reflects a similar arrangement which applied only in that tournament's very early years. The
America's Cup
The America's Cup, informally known as the Auld Mug, is a trophy awarded in the sport of sailing. It is the oldest international competition still operating in any sport. America's Cup match races are held between two sailing yachts: one f ...
is decided between the winners of separate champion and challenger tournaments, respectively for yachts from the country of the reigning champion, and of all other countries. The
Ranfurly Shield
The Ranfurly Shield, colloquially known as the Log o' Wood, is a trophy in New Zealand's domestic rugby union competition. First played for in 1904, the Shield is based on a challenge system. The holding union must defend the shield in challeng ...
in New Zealand rugby union is a challenge trophy between provincial teams, in which the holders of the Shield retain it until they are beaten by a challenging province.
;
Ladder tournament
A ladder tournament (also known as a ladder competition or pyramid tournament) is a form of tournament for games and sports. Unlike many tournaments, which usually have an element of elimination, ladder competitions can go on indefinitely. In a lad ...
: The ladder is an extension of the challenge system. All competitors are ranked on a "ladder". New contestants join the bottom of the ladder. Any contestant can challenge a competitor ranked slightly higher; if the challenger wins the match (or the challenge is refused) they swap places on the ladder. Ladders are common in internal club competitions in individual sports, like
squash
Squash may refer to:
Sports
* Squash (sport), the high-speed racquet sport also known as squash racquets
* Squash (professional wrestling), an extremely one-sided match in professional wrestling
* Squash tennis, a game similar to squash but pla ...
and
pool
Pool may refer to:
Water pool
* Swimming pool, usually an artificial structure containing a large body of water intended for swimming
* Reflecting pool, a shallow pool designed to reflect a structure and its surroundings
* Tide pool, a rocky pool ...
. Another ladder system is to give competitors a certain number of ranking points at the start. If two competitors play each other, then the winner will gain a percentage of the loser's ranking points. In this way competitors that join later will generally start in the middle, since top competitors already have won ranking points and bottom competitors have lost them.
;Selection: A champion may be selected by an authorised or self-appointed group, often after a
vote
Voting is a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, can engage for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns. Democracies elect holde ...
. While common in non-competitive activities, ranging from
science fair
Science and engineering fairs, hosted by schools worldwide, offer students the opportunity to experience the practices of science and engineering for themselves. In the United States, the Next Generation Science Standards makes experiencing the ...
s to
cinema
Cinema may refer to:
Film
* Cinematography, the art of motion-picture photography
* Film or movie, a series of still images that create the illusion of a moving image
** Film industry, the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking
* ...
's
Oscars
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...
, this is rarely significant in sports and games. Though unofficial, the polls run by the
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
and others were prestigious titles in
American college football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football in the United States, American football rules first gained populari ...
prior to the creation in
1998
1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''.
Events January
* January 6 – The '' Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently ...
of the
Bowl Championship Series
The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a selection system that created four or five bowl game match-ups involving eight or ten of the top ranked teams in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of American college football, including ...
, a quasi-official national championship (to this day, the
NCAA
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
does not officially award
a championship
The A Championship, also known as the Newstalk A Championship, was an association football league featuring League of Ireland reserve teams and emerging senior teams. It was a third level league in the Republic of Ireland football league system. ...
in
the top division of college football). From
2005
File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris was discovered in ...
until the final season of the BCS in
2013
File:2013 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: Edward Snowden becomes internationally famous for leaking classified NSA wiretapping information; Typhoon Haiyan kills over 6,000 in the Philippines and Southeast Asia; The Dhaka garment fact ...
, the
AP Poll
The Associated Press poll (AP poll) provides weekly rankings of the top 25 NCAA teams in one of three Division I college sports: football, men's basketball and women's basketball. The rankings are compiled by polling 62 sportswriters and broadca ...
operated independently from the BCS, and two other polls were part of the BCS formula. The BCS was replaced by the
College Football Playoff
The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level ...
, a four-team tournament whose participants are chosen by a selection committee, in 2014 NCAA Division I FBS football season, 2014; since then, all polls have operated independently from the CFP.
Tournaments of value
Tournaments of value have come to legitimise what are often seen as marginalised practices that sit outside of popular culture. For example, the Grammy Award ceremony helped to shape country music as a viable commercial field, and Booker Prize ceremony helped to create new fields of literary fiction. Tournaments of value go beyond game show and simple contests as the tournament itself emerges as being more significant, bestowing status and prestige on the winner and, in the process, shapes industry practices and acts as institutional mechanisms for shaping social fields.
See also
*Playoff format
*Apertura and Clausura
*Tennis tour
References
{{Authority control
Tournament systems,