Draft:Pots System Competition Format

Pots System Competition Format

The Pots System competition format (or competition by “Zones”), is a tournament or contest model with a corresponding fixture , which can be utilized across a large number of sports tournaments, e-sports and other types of competitive events or contests.

Unlike other competition formats (as round-robin, direct elimination, groups, the Swiss system tournament, and others), which have been in place for over a century, the Pots System is relatively recent. It was originally developed, and Copyright registered in 2006, by Leandro Shara Lillo, a Chilean amateur mathematician who has specialized himself on the design of solutions for competitive situations. A number of his works are and whose a number of works are Copyright registered in Chile, including the Pots System © itself. 1 Such Copyright registrations are effective globally under the principles of the Berne Convention.

The Pots System is significantly different from traditional competition formats and has been utilized in the first stage of short term competitions (actually during the largest and longest lasting stages), across diverse sports, more frequently in Football.

Under the Pots System, the number of participant teams or players (whichever is the case, according to the specific sport) is far more flexible than under other formats. For example, in football, traditional short competitions like FIFA World Cup or ATP tournaments encompass a number of teams of multiples of 2, for either tournaments in groups or direct elimination (i.e. 8, 16, 32, 64 or 128 participants). When competition organizers require a different number of participants, such groups or direct elimination formats either do not work or when forced to work, result in difficulties of sports justice, transparency, speculation or match-fixing prone situations. 2 Such is the case for tournaments of, for example, 10, 12, 18, 20, 22, 26, 30, 36, 40, 48 , 50 or any non-traditional number of participants. For the same reasons, there do not exist tournaments of either top 10 or top ranked teams or players. Under the Pots format, competition with such number of teams are possible and comply with principles of sports justice, equal opportunities and transparency.

Basic Structure of the Pots Format

The Pots (or zones) are integrated by teams or individual competitors (if the sport competition is between individuals, like chess or tennis). The criteria to determine which participant integrates which Por, may be based on diverse criteria, including, but not limited to, actual ranking, current performance, geographical location, historical results, among other criteria.

Basically, all pots should comprise the same number of participants and pairing off for matches requires that each team plays against a team from each pot, including ones own’s pot.

Upon completion of the specified dates of the Pots Stage, teams are ranked within a single general standing. Best ranked teams qualify for subsequent stages. A significant value -added factor from the Pots format is, that unlike other formats, the Pots System is a type of competition in which all matches (or games) count. For example, unlike the Groups Format, under Pots, before the completion of the tournament or Pots stage, there are no early qualified contestants or early eliminated contestants in the first phase, and final ranking of all teams/players is know when the very last or two last matches are played. The consequence is that each participant is obligated to play each match intensely.

Thereafter, the pairings for the second round depend on the results from the first round. In other words, the better a team performs in the First Phase or Pots Phase, in the subsequent phase the weakest team from the First Phase it will play with. Therefore, the Pots format has at least two distinct phases: the Pots Phase and thereafter, the Final Phase.

Use of the Pots Format

The Pots System may be utilized across various types of direct confrontation tournaments, such as football, basketball, tennis, boxing, judo, chess, e-sports, which traditionally use other systems such as Round-Robin, direct elimination (or Playoffs) and groups, among others. However, the ise of the Pots format stands out in scenarios where the competition requirements make it difficult or impossible to use traditional systems.

As mentioned earlier, the general public might wonder why the Tennis Tournament ATP Finals (ref. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATP_Finals) , has 8 participant players rather than the ATP top 10 ranked players. This can be explained by the rigidity from traditional formats (Groups and Playoffs). With the Pots Format, this important tournament could be held in the same 5 dates (as actually), comprising the ATP top 10 ranked players of the moment. The competition would have only three additional matches, within the same number of dates. Additionally, there will not exist, “dead matches” and the competition will not have early qualified or early eliminated players, until the very last match finishes.

Tournament Design: Procedure for Pairings

Each competition is unique because the format determines the number of matches. A number of determinants can be factored in for the design of the specific number of Pots and the definition of the number of dates-matches. Such determinants are number of participants, tournament timeframe, number of dates, number of venues, frequency of the usage of venues, , rest days for venues and participants, restrictions due to limiting travel required, budgets and other aspects, all of which are defined and considered for the format itself. Upon defining the prior, the pairing of teams/players, or the fixture, is defined, as explained above, by distributing participants across Pots (or zones). Each participant, then, must play with one participant from each Pot, including their own.

In a basic expression of what the Tournament Format could be, an example could consider 3 Pots (Pots A, B, and C), where the Pots are organized by ranking. In such case, Pot A would comprise top ranked teams. Then Pot B will include middle-tier teams, and Pot C, the emerging or lower performing teams from the competition. Thus, having three Pots, the competition will comprise three matches in the First Phase. Each team, regardless of which Pot it has been placed, will then play 3 matches: one against a Team A, another against a Team B, and another against a Team C. This will ensure sports fairness and a high-quality tournament. However, based on the same example, two matches could be played with opponents from each Zone, and thus, implement multiple combinations, which is impossible in other formats. A key consequence is that the Pots Format is significantly flexible in terms of the number of participants, dates, Pots, and a number of other parameters.

Final Scores and Tie-Breakers in a First Pots Phase of a Competition

Upon the completion of all matches from a First Phase of Pots, participants are ranked within a single general standing, or table, which comprises all contestants with their respective scores. This table determines which participants qualify for a subsequent phase and which do not, depending on the tournament's requirements. For example, under a certain tournament, it may be desirable to have 16 participants qualifying for a next phase, while a different competition may require only 8 may be required, or perhaps 12. Such depends largely on each tournament's needs.

While the allocation of points for wins/draws/losses may vary depending on the nature and requirements of the tournament or specific sport rules, if a situation arises where more than one team scores the necessary points to qualify for the next phase the use of the method called "Relative Points" system is recommended 3 . This system assigns higher or lower number of points based on each participant’s position in the table (Ref. Main Article: “Relative Points”).

Analysis, Advantages, and Disadvantages of the Pots Format

As indicated above, the Pots System has several advantages over traditional systems:

● Due to the format's nature, all teams are incentivized to always win, as there is no room for result manipulation for "strategic" reasons. 4

● There are no predetermined or early qualified or eliminated participants, which incentivizes a higher level of competitiveness.

● The Pots System is highly flexible and facilitates defining the number of teams, dates, schedules, travel restrictions or uniform rules, rest days, etc., with significantly more flexibility that traditional formats.

For example, with the Group System, in competitions under groups of 4 participants, it is impossible to organize a first round with 4 dates. With the Pots System, it is possible, as the tournament could easily comprise 4 Pots.

An additional example, with a Direct Elimination Format, there cannot exist a competition of 18 participants, all of the, starting on the same date. By using the Pots System, it's possible, using 3 Pots of 6 contestants so as to later determine 4 semi-finalists (top 4 ranked in the general standing.

● Under the Pots format, the competition is "everyone against everyone" within the same general standing or table. Such incentivizes audience engagement, from the beginning to the end of the tournament, as all results are relevant for all participants, even if they don't face each other.

The creation of the Pots Format

The first public presentation of this system was conducted in 2003, by Leandro Shara himself, to CONMEBOL (South American Football Confederation) in response to FIFA's need to expand the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany, from 32 to 36 participants. At such time, FIFA’s President, Mr. Joseph Blatter, and the President of the German Federation, Wolfgang Niersbach (who also performed as Vice President of the 2006 World Cup Organizing Committee) publicly stated that FIFA had been waiting to find a concrete solution to expand the World Cup competition from 32 to 36 teams. Mr. Blatter openly declared that, despite consulting various of the world’s largest consulting firms, no solution had been found for a 36-team competition. When asked if there was nobody in FIFA or in the world who could provide a solution, Blatter responded, "There is no one in the world who can give us the solution. There is no Einsteinian Institute that can easily and simply reduce the number of teams from 36 in the first round to just 16 in the second round." At such time, Mr. Shara had already been working on resolving tournament formats for years.

Forward to the above mentioned presentation, CONMEBOL indicated they had no interest in either utilizing or recommending to FIFA such format, However, a few weeks later, Mr Shara he learned through the press that of the competitive procedure of the Pots Format would be used by CONMEBOL in “Copa Libertadores”. As CONMEBOL didn't even ask for Mr. Shara´s consent, he decided to register the Pots Format under the Chilean Intellectual Property Rights Registry, becoming a pioneer in protecting competition formats.

Since then, Shara, directly and through his company, MatchVision, has presented the Pots System to a large number of sports federations, sports authorities, sports consultants and the press.

Football

● Copa Chile 2011 (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copa_Chile_2011)

● National Football Tournament of the Armed Forces of Chile 2014, Puerto Montt, Chile.

● Copa Peru, from 2015 and onwards. The national stage of Copa Peru encompasses 50 teams and the Pots Format has been in place since 2015. This competition has also utilized the “Relative Points” methodology for tie-breaking. (ref. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copa_Per%C3%BA_2015).

● CONCACAF Nations League 2019-2020.

Futsal:

● 2011 National Futsal Tournament, Algeria, played in Vald'Hydra, Algiers.

Beach Soccer:

• 2009 Beach Volleyball Tournament, Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro.

Chess:

• National University Chess Tournament, played at the Faculty of Law of the University of Chile, Santiago de Chile.

Table Tennis:

● 2011 National Table Tennis Tournament in Algeria, played in the city of Boudouaou, Algeria.

Other Formats designed by Mr Leandro Shara:

● 2010 National FedeFutbol Championship Tournament, Professional Soccer of Costa Rica.

● In 2010, through FedeFutbol, the format used for the qualifiers for the 2014 Brazil and 2018 Russia World Cups was presented to CONCACAF.

References

1 The Pots System copyright at the Chilean Registry of Intellectual Property, has the Record Number 154857, dated May 17, 2006,with additional complement filings with Record Number 224501 from December 26th, 2012.

2 There are many cases in which disadvantages happen like a) seeding participants (unequal number of matches played in a competition), b) in competitions of 12 teams under groups of 4, when 2 best performing third places would qualify for the next round and implies that 66.66% of total teams qualify for next round of 8, thus reducing overall competitiveness.

3 The Relative Points methodology was also originally developed and Copyright registered by Leandro Shara Lillo.

4 Such includes incentives for speculation on results, especially on calculating of playing towards either securing or preventing to face specific contestants in a subsequent phase. Also., “strategic” results implies incentives for potential match-fixing.

5 http://keirradnedge.com/2018/03/20/matchvision-breakthrough/

6 http://keirradnedge.com/2014/02/28/tomorrows-world-cup-leandro-shara-has-figured-out-how-to-put-life-back-into-the-group-game/

7 https://www.reuters.com/article/soccer-tournaments-idUKL3N12S5E220151028

8 https://www.reuters.com/article/soccer-euro-format-idINKCN0Z71P0

9 https://dechalaca.com/informes/opinion/shara-and-listen

10 https://vimeo.com/168524603