What are Sports Tournaments
Tournaments,
as defined by Merriam-Webster, are a series of contests that make up a single
unit of competition. They are a gathering of individuals or teams that compete
against each other in order to determine the winner or who among them is the
best. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping
senses:
· One
or more competitions held at single venue and concentrated into relatively
short duration of time.
· A
competition involving a number of matches, each involving a set of competitors,
with overall winner of tournament determined based on combine results of
individual matches. Such tournaments allow large numbers to compete against
each other in spite of restriction on numbers in single match.
These
two senses are distinct. The golf tournaments meet the first define but while
match play tournaments meet the second define, stroke play tournaments don’t,
since there are no distinct matches within tournament. In association football
leagues such as Premier League are tournaments in 2nd sense, but not
the first, having matches spread across, many venues. There are some other
tournaments that meet both defines such as Wimbledon tennis championship.
Tournament
match
Tournament
match may involve one or more games-match and if necessary one or more
tiebreak-matches among competitors. For example, in Davis Cup tennis
tournament, a tie between two nations involves five rubbers between nation’s
athletes. Team that wins the most rubber wins the tie. In later rounds of UEFA
Champions League, each fixture is played over two legs, the scores of each leg
are added and team with high score wins the fixture and if necessary, penalty
shoot-out used if scores are equal after both matches.
Knockout
Tournaments
They
are also known as elimination tournament, is divided into successive round;
each competitor plays in at least one fixture per round. The top-ranked
competitor or winner in each fixture progress to next round. As round proceeds,
the competitors and fixtures decrease. The final round also known as cup final,
consist up of only one fixture, the winner of which is overall champion.
In
single-elimination tournament, just top-ranked competitors in fixture progress;
in 2-competitor games, just winner progresses. All other competitors are eliminated.
This ensures that a winner is decided with minimum number of fixtures. However,
many other competitors are eliminated after few matches.
A
double-elimination tournament may be used in 2-competitor games to allow each
competitor a single loss without being eliminated from tournament. All losers from
main bracket enter a loser bracket, winner of which plays off against main
bracket’s winner.
Group
Tournaments
A
group tournament or league involves all competitors playing a number of
fixtures (fixture may contain one or more game-matches between matches). Points
are awarded for each fixture, with competitors ranked based either on total
number of points or average points. Each competitors plays equal number of fixtures,
in which case ranking by total points and by average points are equivalent. The
English Country Championship in crocket didn’t require an equal number of
matches.
Poker
Tournaments
In
poker tournaments, when players are eliminated, the number of tables is reduced
gradually, with remaining players redistributed among remaining tables. Play
continues until one player has won all of chips one play. Finishing order is
determined by order in which players are eliminated: last player remaining gets
first place, last player eliminated gets second and previous player eliminated
gets third position.
In
a shootout tournament, players don’t change tables until table has been reduced
to single player.
Bridge
Tournaments
The
bridge tournaments are composed up of multiple events. Some events may be
single-elimination, double elimination or Swiss style. However, Paris events
are most widespread. In such events, number of boards are each played several
times by various players. For each board the score achieved by each north-south
pair is then measured against all other north-south pairs, playing the same
board.
Requirements
for Tournament
There
are following requirements for ideal tournaments:
· The
tournament should determine the best competitor as competition winner with
greatest possible probability. The final rankings should reflect true strength
of competitors accurately.
· Other
general framework conditions should be as equal as possible for all competitors.
For example, all competitors should have same regeneration time between
matches. As a consequence, both participants playing a match should, a rule,
have played same number of matches in tournaments so far.
· Tiebreak
criteria should be transparent and based on sporting merit only.
· For
spectators, exciting matches between best pretenders to championship are
desirable. Therefore, proportion of such games should be high as possible.
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