Squash Tournament Formats Explained: A Guide to Most Common Squash Draw Types

If you have ever wondered about the different types of draws that tournament organisers use, then this post is for you. We’ll discuss the most common types of draws and the pros and cons of each one.

The most common draw templates that you will see in Junior Squash tournaments are:

  1. Round Robin draw
  2. Cross-pool draw
  3. Swiss pairing draw

I am going to discuss the draws in the context of a typical weekend tournament, meaning that there are usually 4 or 5 rounds.   Please keep in mind that this post is for general information and education.

Ranking and Seeding: understanding the difference

Ranking

A rank is a position of a player or team on a list of all the players for a club, province, region, or country, based on the player’s or team’s performance in events. Rankings are typically used to compare the relative strengths of teams or individuals.

In NJSA, the NJSA Ladder is updated after every official tournament (NJSA or other tournaments) where NJSA players have played against other NJSA players in the same age group.  The NJSA Ladder is therefore shows the ranking of each player in NJSA.

For example, when a player has won a few tournaments, that player is ranked at position 1.

Seeding

A seed is a position that is given to a player in a specific tournament, as an indication of where this player is expected to finish in that specific tournament. For example, the nr 1 seed is the most likely to win the tournament.

Ranking (the position of players) is often used to determine the seeding for an event (where they are expected to finish in that tournament).  Keep in mind that seeding is often a bit more of an art than a science, as players must be “seeded” for a tournament even when they may not have ever played against each other.

Next, let’s have a look at the three most common types of tournament formats.

Round Robin Draw

The round-robin draw is one of the easiest and most fair draw.  In this draw, each player plays against every other player in the group.  It is perfect for smaller groups, like 4 to 6 players.  Another advantage of this draw, is that the seeding (the position of ranking of the players) is not that important, as each player will play against every other player.

For example, if you have 6 players, then each player will play 5 matches.

This draw format is not ideal for larger groups, as then a player must play 6 or more games over a weekend, which is not practical.  It is also too exhausting for players.

One thing that I like about a round-robin format that it is a friendlier format.  Why?  Because if you have a group of say 12 players, you can break it up into 2 groups of 6 players, with the stronger 6 players together in a group, and the less-strong players together in a group.  It is therefore more more encouraging for the weaker players to play in a group of similar strength, and not have to play against a very strong player which can be demotivating to that player.

Example

In this example, we’ll go through a 5-player draw.  The table that you will see looks like the one below.  We’ll follow the matches of Player A, and fill in the table.

The first match for Player A was against Player B.  Player A won 3-0 against Player B. On the scoreboard, in the row for Player A, the score that Player A got, which is 3 games, is entered under the column of Player B.

Next, the row for Player B, the score of 0 games is placed the row for Player B, in the column of Player A.

Next, player A wins 3-1 against Player C.  In the row of Player A, 3 games are entered in the column under Player C.  In the row for Player C, 1 game is entered under the column of Player A.

In the final match against Player E, Player A wins 3-2.  Here’s how the scoreboard looks now:

Next, Player A loses 2-3 against Player D.  Here’s how the scoreboard looks now:

So, after all the rounds, Player A as a total of 11 points.  We always look at the row of the player to count their score.

Let’s assume that now all the other players’ matches are complete, and now the scoreboard looks like this:

The scores are tallied up across the rows.  Player D is the winner with 12 points, as this player won all his/her matches.  Player A came in 2nd place with 11 points.  In third place is Player E with 9 points.

Player B and C are now equal with 6 points each. Now you will only look at the match result between Player B and C. You can see that Player B beat Player C with a score of 3-1.  Therefore Player B is in position 4 and Player C finishes in position 5.

And that is how a Pooled Draw works.

Cross-Pool Draw

This type of draw is ideal when you have 8 players or even 10 players in an age group.  The players are divided into two pools, and the players in each pool play a round-robin.  After all the round-robin matches are completed, then the winner of Pool A plays against the winner of Pool B for 1st and 2nd place.  The players who came in 2nd in the Round Robin pools, then play out for positions 3 and 4.  And so on for the rest of the players.

In this format the seeding of the players is important.  Why?  Because the players are divided into the pools based on strength.

Here’s how the seeding works.   The strongest player is placed in position 1, the next strongest player is placed in position 2, and so on.  For this example, I have used Player A as the strongest player, Player B as the next strongest player, and so forth.

Next, the players are divided into two pools.  Here’s how the division typically happens:

Player A is placed in Pool A, Player B in Pool B.  Then Player C is placed in Pool B, and then switching over to Pool A, player D is placed in Pool A.  If you draw a picture with arrows, you will see a criss-cross pattern of how the players are divided into the pools.

So here is wat the 2 pools will look like after the players have been divided into the pools:

The players are then placed into the two pools, and each pool now play a round-robin in their pool.

Now, the round-robin matches are finished.  Let’s assume the scoreboard looks like this, and the positions of each pool are now done:

For the final round, the nr 1 player of Pool A will play against the nr 1 player in Pool B.  The nr 2 player in Pool A will play against the nr 2 player in Pool B, the nr 3 player in Pool A will play against the nr 3 player in Pool B, lastly, the nr 4 player in Pool A will play against the nr 4 player in Pool B.

These last rounds determine the final positions for this age group.

Swiss Pairing Draw

When age groups are larger, like 16 players, a Swiss Pairing format is often used.  This format allows for large groups to play, as a round-robin or even a cross-pool format is impractical due to the time and size of the tournament.

A key aspect of Swiss Pairing is that the seeding for the tournament has to be accurate.  If the seeding is not correct, it can cause upsets.

Swiss Pairing works well for groups of 16 players or 32 players.  For 16 players you will have 4 rounds, and for 32 players there will be 5 rounds of matches.

How Swiss Pairing Works

The players are seeded according to strength.  The format of the tournament is that players play according to their number.  After each round, the winner takes the higher number, and the loser takes the lower number for the next round.

Let’s take you through the details in an example.

Swiss Pairing: An Example

For this example, we will review a 16-player Swiss Format draw.

The first and most important step is the seeding of the players.  Tournament organisers put a huge amount of effort in to getting the seedings correct (based on ranking/ladders of the provinces) and results placed on SportyHQ.  Players are then seeded according to strength.

In this example, I have created the following seeding.  To make it easy, I used alphabetical names in the seeding.

For the first round, the top 8 players will play against the bottom 8 players.  The players 1 to 8 are listed from top to bottom, and then the last 8 players are listed against them, but from the bottom up.

This means that nr 1 is playing against nr 16, nr 2 is playing against nr 15, and so on.

If we put the names in, it would look like this:

What is happening is that the group of 16 players are being split into 2 groups.  After round 1 there will be a top group and a bottom group.  However, the players in the bottom group (the lower-seeded players) have ONE opportunity to play to get into the top group of 8 players.

Remember, that if you win a match, you now take the higher number into the next round, and if you lose, you take the lower number into the next round.

For this example, let’s assume that players 1-8 won all their matches.  This means they keep their number (as it is the higher number), and the lower players on the right keep their numbers.

The group of 16 players are now effectively divided into 2 groups after round 1: A top group of 8 players, and a bottom group of 8 players.  Next, the same principle now applies:  in the top group, the first 4 players are paired up against the lower 4 players, and the same for the bottom group.

Round 2 results

In Round 2, nr 5 Emile won against nr 4 Devon.  This now means that Emile takes the higher number, nr 4, while Devon now moves to nr 5.   In the lower group, Nico beat Kayden.  This means that Nico now is nr 11 in the next round, while Kayden is now nr 14 in the next round.

They will now take their new numbers into Round 3.

Round 3

The next round will look like the grouping below.  I have highlighted the numbers where players changed numbers.

You should see a pattern emerging here, where after each round the group is split up into a top part and a bottom part.

Round 3 results

In round 3, there were now a lot of upsets:

  • Nr 4 Emile beats nr 1 Anton, which means that Anton moves to nr 4 and Emile moves to nr 1.
  • Nr 7 Gert beats nr 6 Frans. So Gert now has nr 6, while Frans moves down to nr 7.
  • Nr 12 Luke beats nr 9 Ian, which means that Luke takes nr 9, while Ian now moves down to nr 12.

Round 4

The last and final round (Round 4) will now look like this:

This final round now determines the final positions.  Nr 1 Emile and nr 2 Ben is playing for FIRST and SECOND place, nr 3 Charl and nr 4 Anton is playing for THIRD and FOUTH place, and so on.

Round 4 results

In the last and final round, the results were as follows:

  • Nr 2 Ben beat nr 1 Emile.  So Ben is the winner and Emile is now in 2nd place.
  • Nr 8 Harry beat nr 7 Frans, so Harry is in 7th place, while Frans finishes in 8th place.
  • Nr 16 Paul beat nr 15 Oliver, so Paul finishes in 15th place, and Oliver finishes in 16th place.

Just for a final comparison, I have placed each player’s original seeding in brackets behind the name.  Now you can see how the players shifted in positions over 4 rounds.

What a Swiss Pairing Draw looks like

This has been a long explanation of how a Swiss Pairing draw works.  In reality, you will only see a spreadsheet with number of matches for the rounds, and an instruction that “Winner takes higher number, Loser takes lower number”.  Here is what it could like like:

The Reality of Tournaments

In this post I have explained the three most common draw formats that are used in junior squash tournaments.  The reality however is that sometimes the number of entries into an age group is a weird number, like 9 entries, or 14 entries, or 21 entries.  It is then that tournament organisers often use a combination of these draws to create a final draw.

Here are a few examples of combinations:

  • 1 round of Swiss Pairing, followed by round-robin groups.
  • Two rounds of Swiss Pairing, followed by round-robin groups.
  • 3 groups of round-robin, followed by cross-pool groups of round-robins.

In Closing

Understanding how the different draws work is important for tournament players and parents.

Written by Adele du Rand

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