Balancing the Game: Comparative Analysis of Single Heuristics and Adaptive Heuristic Approaches for Sports Scheduling Problem

Sport timetabling problems are Combinatorial Optimization problems which involve the creation of schedules that determine when and where teams compete against each other. One specific type of sports scheduling, the double round-robin (2RR) tournament, mandates that each team faces every other team twice, once at their home venue and once at the opponent’s. Despite the relatively small number of teams involved, the sheer volume of potential scheduling combinations has spurred researchers to employ various techniques to find efficient solutions for sports scheduling problems. In this thesis, we present a comparative analysis of single and adaptive heuristics designed to efficiently solve sports scheduling problems. Specifically, our focus is on constructing time-constrained double round-robin tournaments involving 16 to 20 teams, while adhering to hard constraints and minimizing penalties for soft constraints violations. The computational results demonstrate that our adaptive heuristic approach not only successfully finds feasible solutions for the majority of instances but also outperforms the single heuristics examined in this study.Master's Thesis in InformaticsINF399MAMN-INFMAMN-PRO

A constrained sports scheduling problem

AbstractA real case of sports scheduling problem is presented. A calendar for two leagues has to be constructed; besides the usual restrictions on the alternation of home- and away-games, one has to consider the fact that some pairs of teams in the two leagues share the same facilities and cannot play home-games simultaneously. Furthermore depending on the results in the first games, one of the leagues is divided for the last games into two subleagues. An optimal solution is constructed by using properties of oriented factorizations of complete graphs

Referee assignment in the Chilean football league using integer programming and patterns

This article uses integer linear programming to address the referee assignment problem in the First Division of the Chilean professional football league. The proposed approach considers balance in the number of matches each referee must officiate, the frequency of each referee being assigned to a given team, the distance each referee must travel over the course of a season, and the appropriate pairings of referee experience or skill category with the importance of the matches. Two methodologies are studied, one traditional and the other a pattern-based formulation inspired by the home-away patterns for scheduling season match calendars. Both methodologies are tested in real-world and experimental instances, reporting results that improve significantly on the manual assignments. The pattern-based formulation attains major reductions in execution times, solving real instances to optimality in just a few seconds, while the traditional one takes anywhere from several minutes to more than an hour.Fil: Alarcón, Fernando. Universidad de Chile; ChileFil: Duran, Guillermo Alfredo. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales. Instituto de Cálculo; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Guajardo, Mario. Norwegian School of Economics; Norueg

Improved Regional Sports Scheduling using SAS Optgraph

My project improves upon the tmanual cluster method of state interleague scheduling used by the Georgia State Soccer Association by use of an automated multi-round linear assignment algorithm based on SAS Optgraph. Currently, interleague schedules are formed by manually grouping teams according to placement on a map. Typically, ten teams are assigned to a group and each team plays all of the others once per season (nine games). This approach has two flaws: 1) distance on a map does not always correlate with travel time, and 2) assigning teams to clusters precludes teams from playing teams from other groups. The second flaw becomes particularly apparent when the ideal boundaries between clusters are not obvious, but they must be drawn based on a ten-team cluster. The improved system uses travel time between venues as the edge weight and multiple rounds of linear-assignment mapping to generate a full schedule. As Optgraph only supports bipartite linear mapping, the nodes are randomly partitioned between an A and a B subgraph, which is shuffled after each round. This approach is also compared to a non-bipartite matching algorithm written in Python

Soccer schedules in Europe: an overview

In this paper, we give an overview of the competition formats and the schedules used in 25 European soccer competitions for the season 2008-2009. We discuss how competitions decide the league champion, qualification for European tournaments, and relegation. Following Griggs and Rosa (Bull. ICA 18:65-68, 1996), we examine the popularity of the so-called canonical schedule. We investigate the presence of a number of properties related to successive home or successive away matches (breaks) and of symmetry between the various parts of the competition. We introduce the concept of ranking-balancedness, which is particularly useful to decide whether a fair ranking can be made. We also determine how the schedules manage the carry-over effect. We conclude by observing that there is quite some diversity in European soccer schedules, and that current schedules leave room for further optimizing

A 2.75-Approximation Algorithm for the Unconstrained Traveling Tournament Problem

A 2.75-approximation algorithm is proposed for the unconstrained traveling tournament problem, which is a variant of the traveling tournament problem. For the unconstrained traveling tournament problem, this is the first proposal of an approximation algorithm with a constant approximation ratio. In addition, the proposed algorithm yields a solution that meets both the no-repeater and mirrored constraints. Computational experiments show that the algorithm generates solutions of good quality.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figur

A flexible mathematical model for the planning and designing of a sporting fixture by considering the assignment of referees

Indexación: Scopus.This paper deals with the problems faced with the designing and planning of a sporting fixture considering correct referee assignments. A non-linear binary program model is proposed to solve the problems, which aims to minimize the sums of the differences that exist between the requirements of each match and the quality of the referee assigned achieving the design of the most adequate referee for each match. The efficiency of the proposed model is proved using some real data obtained from various fixtures for sports such as soccer, volleyball, and basketball. The mathematical model is solved by using CPLEX 12.7.0., which allows the automatic linearization of the problems. The results obtained demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed methodology for tackling problems, as well as its extension to other sporting disciplines, which require a similar type of planning. Similarly, given the robust nature of the proposed model, it is possible to implement other objective functions in accordance with the requirements of each league. © 2019 by the authors; licensee Growing Science, Canada.http://growingscience.com/beta/ijiec/2960-a-flexible-mathematical-model-for-the-planning-and-designing-of-a-sporting-fixture-by-considering-the-assignment-of-referees.htm