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The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be either a single game, a series of games, or a tournament, and may use a single-elimination system or one of several other different playoff formats. Playoff, in regard to international fixtures, is to qualify or progress to the next round of a competition or tournament.
A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses:
- One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentrated into a relatively short time interval.
- A competition involving a number of matches, each involving a subset of the competitors, with the overall tournament winner determined based on the combined results of these individual matches. These are common in those sports and games where each match must involve a small number of competitors: often precisely two, as in most team sports, racket sports and combat sports, many card games and board games, and many forms of competitive debating. Such tournaments allow large numbers to compete against each other in spite of the restriction on numbers in a single match.
In sports leagues, promotion and relegation is a process where teams can move up and down between multiple divisions arranged in a hierarchical structure, based on their performance over a season. Leagues that use promotion and relegation systems are often called open leagues. In a system of promotion and relegation, the best-ranked team(s) in a lower division are promoted to a higher division for the next season, and the worst-ranked team(s) in the higher division are relegated to the lower division for the next season. During the season, teams that are high enough in the league table that they would qualify for promotion are sometimes said to be in the promotion zone, and those at the bottom are in the relegation zone.
The English Football League Championship, known simply as the Championship in England and for sponsorship purposes as Sky Bet Championship, is the highest division of the English Football League (EFL) and second-highest overall in the English football league system, after the Premier League, and is currently contested by 24 clubs.
The Apertura and Clausura tournaments is a split season format for Spanish-speaking sports leagues. It is a relatively recent innovation for many Latin American football leagues in which the traditional association football season from August to May is divided in two sections per season, each with its own champion. Apertura and Clausura are the Spanish words for "opening" and "closing". In French-speaking Haiti, these are known as the Ouverture and the Fermeture, while in English-speaking Belize, they are respectively the Opening and Closing seasons. When used in the United States and Canada, they are known as the Spring and Fall seasons.
The Indonesian football league system is a series of league system for association football clubs in Indonesia. Since 1994, Liga Indonesia is the league competition featuring association football clubs, as a result of two existing top-flight football leagues merger: Perserikatan (amateur) and Galatama. Liga Indonesia is managed by PSSI, the Indonesian national football federation, and operated by PT. Liga Indonesia Baru and its previous iterations.
The National First Division (NFD), officially known as the Motsepe Foundation Championship for sponsorship reasons, is the second-highest league of South African club football after the South African Premier Division. Both the NFD and South African Premier Division are organised by the Premier Soccer League.
The S1 League, or simply S1, also known as Sri Lanka Champions League, is the second tier division of the Sri Lankan football league system. It was succeeded by the professional Sri Lanka Super League which serves as the first division. Until 2019, it was sponsored by Dialog Axiata and was thus officially known as the Dialog Champions League.
The Sri Lanka national rugby union team, known as the Tuskers, represents Sri Lanka in men's international rugby union. The team has yet to make their debut at the Rugby World Cup. They have the longest tradition of organised club rugby in Asia, dating back to 1879, which was just 8 years after the founding of the world's first rugby union in England. They regularly compete in the Asian Five Nations tournament and are currently in Division I. In the 2010 tournament, they made it to the finals beating Chinese Taipei 37 to 7.
Rugby union in Asia is governed by the Asian Rugby Football Union (ARFU). As of December 2009 there are 28 ARFU member unions, of whom 15 are full members of World Rugby, and six further associate members of World Rugby in Asia. The flagship tournament for promoting the sport in Asia is the Asian Five Nations, which launched in 2008, and which most recently in 2011 saw the national teams of Hong Kong, Japan, Kazakhstan, Sri Lanka and the UAE, compete in the main tournament.
Ratnam SC is a Sri Lankan professional football club based in Colombo, that competes in the Sri Lanka Champions League, the top flight of Sri Lankan football. The club was founded in 1950.
The Thai League 1, often referred to as T1, is the top level of the Thai football league system. Contested by 16 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with Thai League 2. Seasons run from August to May, with each team playing 30 games. It is sponsored by Toyota Motor Thailand and therefore officially known as the Hilux Revo Thai League. In the Thai League, most of the games are played during Saturdays and Sundays, with a few games played on Wednesdays and Fridays.
The CONCACAF Champions Cup is an annual continental club football competition organized by CONCACAF. The tournament is contested by clubs from North America, Central America, and the Caribbean. The winner of the CONCACAF Champions Cup automatically qualifies for the FIFA Club World Cup.
The I-League 2 is an Indian men's professional football league. It is the 3rd tier of the Indian football league system, behind the Indian Super League and the I-League. It operates as a system of promotion and relegation with the I-League and the I-League 3.
Thai League 4, commonly known as the T4, was the fourth level association football league in Thailand. In 2009, it was divided into five groups by geographic region. Each group contained 16 clubs except for the Southern Region group which contained 13 clubs. It was sponsored by AIS and therefore officially known as the AIS Regional League Division 2. In 2016, Khor Royal Cup became a trophy for Regional League Division 2. In 2017, Football Association of Thailand rebranded the league to Thai League 4.
Colombo Football Club, or Colombo FC, is a professional football club based in Colombo, that competes in the Sri Lanka Champions League, the top flight of Sri Lankan football.
The Shaughnessy playoff system is a method of determining the champion of a sports league that is not in a divisional alignment. This format is also known as the Argus finals system. It involves the participation of the top four teams in the league standings in a single elimination tournament. While the first round of the playoffs involve the pairing of the first- and fourth-place teams in one contest and the second- and third-place teams in the other, a variant of the Shaughnessy playoffs would pair the first- and third-place teams in one semifinal round and the second- and fourth-place teams in the other. In either variant, the winners of the first two games would then compete for the league championship. Some lower-level leagues use a Shaughnessy playoff for purposes of promotion to the next-higher league.
Rugby union in Sri Lanka is mainly played at a semi-professional and recreational level. It is a popular team sport with a history dating back to 1879. In 2012, according to International Rugby Board figures, there were over 160,000 registered rugby union players in Sri Lanka, making it the second largest rugby-playing nation in Asia, behind Japan.
The Malaysian football league system, also known as the Malaysian football pyramid, is a series of interconnected leagues for men's football clubs in Malaysia. The system has a hierarchical format with promotion and relegation between leagues at different levels, allowing even the smallest club the hypothetical possibility of ultimately rising to the very top of the system. The exact number of clubs varies from year to year as clubs join and leave leagues or fold altogether, but an estimated average of 10 clubs per division implies that hundreds of teams are members of a league in the Malaysian men's football league system.
The 2017 Davis Cup was the 106th edition of the Davis Cup, a tournament between national teams in men's tennis. It was sponsored by BNP Paribas. France won their tenth title, with Lucas Pouille defeating Steve Darcis of Belgium on indoor hard in the final match held at Stade Pierre-Mauroy located in Villeneuve-d'Ascq on 26 November.
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