Running your first tournament: bracket to final score

Pick a format

Two formats are wired in: single elimination (one loss and you're out) and round robin (everybody plays everybody, top of the table wins). Single elim works best for 16+ entries; round robin for 6–10. Below 6, just run a club night.

Pick the format on the create-tournament screen. You can switch between the two before registration opens; once it opens the format is locked.

Set the entry fee

Optional. If you set a fee, players must complete Stripe checkout to confirm their registration. The bracket isn't published until the registration window closes; if a player paid but the tournament is cancelled they're refunded automatically. Fees settle to your Stripe-connected bank account, same as bookings.

Open registration

Set a registration close date. Members get a banner on their portal home; staff can also send the lifecycle "tournament available" email if you've enabled it.

You can cap entries (16, 24, 32, etc). If you set an open registration with no cap and run single elim, the bracket auto-pads with byes for the round-of-N nearest power of two.

Seeding and the draw

When registration closes, click Generate draw. Two options:

• Random. The default. Top half of the bracket gets the same odd/even split as the bottom.
• Manual. Drag players into seeds 1, 2, 3, etc. Useful if your club has its own ladder.

You can re-generate as long as no match has a posted score. Re-generating after scoring starts is locked.

Score reporting

After each match, either player opens the bracket on their phone, taps the match, and submits the score. Both players' submissions need to agree, or an owner confirms manually. Scores are not public until confirmed — that's the difference between Freyaa and "live scoring" — we only publish what an owner has rubber-stamped.

An owner can override a score from the dashboard at any time. The override is audited (before/after diff in the audit log).

Court allocation

Optional. If your club has reserved courts for the tournament, you can attach the tournament to a court block in the booking grid. Members trying to book those courts see the block and a "Tournament: Spring Open" message rather than an empty slot.

After the final

Confirm the final score. The public bracket page locks. The winner is recorded against the tournament. Refunds, if any, go through Stripe directly. Reports for the event (entries, fees collected, court time used) appear in /dashboard/reportswithin an hour.