{"title":"Mitigating the risk of tanking in multi-stage tournaments","authors":"László Csató","doi":"10.1007/s10479-024-06311-y","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Multi-stage tournaments consisting of a round-robin group stage followed by a knockout phase are ubiquitous in sports. However, this format is incentive incompatible if at least 2 teams from a group advance to the knockout stage where the brackets are predetermined. A model is developed to quantify the risk of tanking in these contests. The suggested approach is applied to the 2022 FIFA World Cup to uncover how its design could have been improved by changing group labelling (a reform that has received no attention before) and the schedule of group matches. Scheduling is found to be a surprisingly weak intervention compared to previous results on the risk of collusion in a group. The probability of tanking, which is disturbingly high around 25%, cannot be reduced by more than 3 percentage points via these policies. Tournament organisers need to consider more fundamental changes against tanking.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":8215,"journal":{"name":"Annals of Operations Research","volume":"344 1","pages":"135 - 151"},"PeriodicalIF":4.4000,"publicationDate":"2024-10-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s10479-024-06311-y.pdf","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Annals of Operations Research","FirstCategoryId":"91","ListUrlMain":"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10479-024-06311-y","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"OPERATIONS RESEARCH & MANAGEMENT SCIENCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Multi-stage tournaments consisting of a round-robin group stage followed by a knockout phase are ubiquitous in sports. However, this format is incentive incompatible if at least 2 teams from a group advance to the knockout stage where the brackets are predetermined. A model is developed to quantify the risk of tanking in these contests. The suggested approach is applied to the 2022 FIFA World Cup to uncover how its design could have been improved by changing group labelling (a reform that has received no attention before) and the schedule of group matches. Scheduling is found to be a surprisingly weak intervention compared to previous results on the risk of collusion in a group. The probability of tanking, which is disturbingly high around 25%, cannot be reduced by more than 3 percentage points via these policies. Tournament organisers need to consider more fundamental changes against tanking.
期刊介绍：
The Annals of Operations Research publishes peer-reviewed original articles dealing with key aspects of operations research, including theory, practice, and computation. The journal publishes full-length research articles, short notes, expositions and surveys, reports on computational studies, and case studies that present new and innovative practical applications.
In addition to regular issues, the journal publishes periodic special volumes that focus on defined fields of operations research, ranging from the highly theoretical to the algorithmic and the applied. These volumes have one or more Guest Editors who are responsible for collecting the papers and overseeing the refereeing process.
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