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Optimal Tournament Design: Lessons From the Men’s Handball Champions League

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  • László Csató

Abstract

This paper challenges the traditional seeding regime of round-robin tournaments that aims to create balanced groups. In particular, the design of the most prestigious European men’s handball club competition is compared to two alternative formats with equally strong groups via simulations. We find that it is possible to increase the quality of all matches played together with raising the uncertainty of outcome, essentially without sacrificing fairness. Our results have useful implications for the governing bodies of major sports.

Suggested Citation

  • László Csató, 2020. "Optimal Tournament Design: Lessons From the Men’s Handball Champions League," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 21(8), pages 848-868, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jospec:v:21:y:2020:i:8:p:848-868
    DOI: 10.1177/1527002520944442
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

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    2. László Csató & Dóra Gréta Petróczy, 2024. "Bibliometric indices as a measure of performance and competitive balance in the knockout stage of the UEFA Champions League," Central European Journal of Operations Research, Springer;Slovak Society for Operations Research;Hungarian Operational Research Society;Czech Society for Operations Research;Österr. Gesellschaft für Operations Research (ÖGOR);Slovenian Society Informatika - Section for Operational Research;Croatian Operational Research Society, vol. 32(4), pages 961-988, December.
    3. Ilya V. Solntsev, Andrey A. Kurov, 2024. "Sports Tournament Design as a Source of Economic Impact (Through the Example of Russian Premier League)," Journal of Applied Economic Research, Graduate School of Economics and Management, Ural Federal University, vol. 23(2), pages 304-340.
    4. Singh, Aaditya & Scarf, Phil & Baker, Rose, 2023. "A unified theory for bivariate scores in possessive ball-sports: The case of handball," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 304(3), pages 1099-1112.
    5. L'aszl'o Csat'o, 2021. "A comparative study of scoring systems by simulations," Papers 2101.05744, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2022.
    6. Csató, László, 2022. "Quantifying incentive (in)compatibility: A case study from sports," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 302(2), pages 717-726.

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