Padel Americano for 9 players on 2 courts
Nine players, two courts, nine rounds. Eight people play each round and one rests. This schedule is as fair as nine players can be:
- Every pair partners exactly once. All 36 possible pairs of players are used, none twice.
- Everyone plays 8 games and rests exactly once.
- Nobody rests twice in a row, and every player meets every other player as an opponent 1–3 times.
- Stop after round 9 and everybody has played the same number of games.
Free, no account: phones enter scores, the TV shows the table live.
The schedule
Give each player a number from 1 to 9 (draw them from a hat). "1 & 5 v 2 & 7" means players 1 and 5 play together against players 2 and 7.
| Round | Court 1 | Court 2 | Rests |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 & 2 v 3 & 4 | 5 & 6 v 7 & 8 | 9 |
| 2 | 5 & 9 v 1 & 7 | 2 & 8 v 4 & 6 | 3 |
| 3 | 1 & 5 v 2 & 6 | 4 & 9 v 3 & 7 | 8 |
| 4 | 2 & 7 v 3 & 8 | 6 & 9 v 4 & 5 | 1 |
| 5 | 4 & 7 v 1 & 8 | 2 & 5 v 3 & 9 | 6 |
| 6 | 4 & 8 v 3 & 5 | 1 & 6 v 2 & 9 | 7 |
| 7 | 3 & 6 v 8 & 9 | 5 & 7 v 1 & 4 | 2 |
| 8 | 6 & 7 v 2 & 3 | 5 & 8 v 1 & 9 | 4 |
| 9 | 7 & 9 v 2 & 4 | 6 & 8 v 1 & 3 | 5 |
Per player
| Player | Games | Rests in round | Different partners | Different opponents |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 8 | 4 | 8 | 8 |
| 2 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 8 |
| 3 | 8 | 2 | 8 | 8 |
| 4 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| 5 | 8 | 9 | 8 | 8 |
| 6 | 8 | 5 | 8 | 8 |
| 7 | 8 | 6 | 8 | 8 |
| 8 | 8 | 3 | 8 | 8 |
| 9 | 8 | 1 | 8 | 8 |
Partner check: the round in which each pair plays together
Read across from one player and down from another. A dash means that pair never plays together. Every cell is filled exactly once: every pair plays together in exactly one round.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 9 | 7 | 3 | 6 | 2 | 5 | 8 | |
| 2 | 1 | 8 | 9 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 6 | |
| 3 | 9 | 8 | 1 | 6 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 5 | |
| 4 | 7 | 9 | 1 | 4 | 2 | 5 | 6 | 3 | |
| 5 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 4 | 1 | 7 | 8 | 2 | |
| 6 | 6 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 1 | 8 | 9 | 4 | |
| 7 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 7 | 8 | 1 | 9 | |
| 8 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 9 | 1 | 7 | |
| 9 | 8 | 6 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 9 | 7 |
How to use it
- Scoring: the usual Americano way is a fixed number of points per game (16, 21, 24 or 32), and every point a pair wins counts for both of its players. With 9 rounds, 21 or 24 points fit in about 2 hours; with less time, play to a set number of minutes per round.
- Ranking: each player's total of points won over their 8 games. Everyone plays 8, so totals compare fairly without averaging.
- Short of time? Stopping early is the one weak spot of a printed sheet: before round 9, some players have rested and some haven't. The live app keeps games level after every round, give or take one, and can rank by points per game.
How we know it is fair
This page is generated by the same scheduling engine that runs the Fair Americano app (engine version 1). The build script then checks every number above against the schedule and refuses to publish the page if one does not hold.
The live app makes its own schedule with the same guarantees, so its rounds may differ from this printed sheet. It also copes with a late arrival or someone leaving early, which a printed sheet can't.
Free, no account: phones enter scores, the TV shows the table live.