Group Tournament Ranking System - Tiebreaker Criteria

Tiebreaker Criteria

When competitors are level on points, there is usually some tiebreaker criterion.

Sometimes, however, ranking ties may stand: prior to 1994, the Five Nations Championship in rugby union could result in joint champions; likewise for the British Home Championship in association football until 1978. In college football in the United States, many conferences permit joint champions. However, if ranking within the conference determines eligibility for a postseason bowl game, tiebreak criteria will be required to separate the joint champions.

A tiebreaker may be a play-off, with extra matches between the tied competitors. This may be a full match or a reduced format such as a penalty shootout. If there are more than two tied competitors in a 2-competitor game, the play-off may be a round-robin or knockout tournament.

Instead of a playoff, the original fixtures may provide the tie-breaker criteria:

head-to-head

considering only results of fixtures between the deadlocked competitors. If more than a single fixture is involved, a subtable may be used recursively for the ranking. For example, in the Super League Greece 2006-07, part of the final table was:

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	Pts
11	Xanthi	30	8	12	10	36
12	Iraklis	30	10	5	15	35
	Apollon Kalamarias	30	9	8	13	35
	Kerkira	30	8	11	11	35
15	Egaleo	30	7	7	16	28

The three teams tied on 35 points were separated by considering only matches between any two of them....:

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	Pts
12	Apollon Kalamarias	4	3	0	1	9
13	Iraklis	4	1	1	2	4
	Kerkira	4	1	1	2	4

...and then again for the two teams still tied:

Pos	Team	P	W	D	L	Pts
13	Iraklis	2	1	1	0	4
14	Kerkira	2	0	1	1	1

scoring average

the ratio of points (goals, etc.) scored to those conceded.

scoring differential

the difference between points (goals, etc.) scored and those conceded.

points scored

irrespective of points conceded.

points scored away

valuing scores "on the road" above scores on one's home ground.

number of wins

in games where draws are possible

disciplinary record

fouls conceded, players sent off, etc.

seeding or pre-tournament ranking

This may be defined to favour the higher- or lower-ranked competitor.

Neustadtl score

the sum of defeated opponents' scores plus half the sum of drawn opponents' scores; this method is especially common in round-robin chess tournaments; in chess Swiss system tournaments it is used as a secondary tie-break criterion.

Ties remaining on one of these criteria may be resolved by resorting in turn to others of them. Where a group is the qualifying phase of a larger tournament, such that ties are not admissible, it may be necessary as a last resort to use drawing of lots as a tiebreaker (as was used in Group F of the 1990 FIFA World Cup to separate second and third place).

Swiss system tournaments use a variety of criteria not found in other types of tournament which exploit features specific to the Swiss system: see tie-breaking in Swiss system tournaments.