An observation from this year's & past year's post tournament reporting of results from West Afrika. If you follow the posts especially those after a tournament has taken place in the WhatsApp Oware group, you will have noticed that, there is always a request for the final full ranking of players that participated in the individual championships, if there is more than one. As is at times the practice in Nigeria 🇳🇬. Unfortunately these request have not been satisfactorily answered.
As I write not even the first 3 positions for each of the championships held in the Lagos State Ayo Tournament & like wise for each of the 5 championships held for the Delta 2022 - 21st NSF Ayo Olopon Championships has been reported. This is in spite of repeated requests to the tournament managers for these reports to be released.
This I have noted is not just a phenomenon that occurred this year. The same has been repeated in past years and in different countries. I have come to the conclusion that the issue is the tournament management format: mini league & a knockout stage. This format the same as adopted in the FIFA World Cup does not lend itself easily to positioning all the players in a final ranking order. Apart from that because the tradition has been to determine just the winner. I wonder if there is a playoff to determine 3rd & 4th, as is the practice with the Football World Cup.
I am assuming this is the reason why comprehensive final results in this format are not presented, even when requested. As has been the case for the last five tournaments that have been showcased in this group: Head of Service Ayo Olopon Championship, Southwest Ayo Olopon Championship. Lagos State Ayo Tournament, Delta 2022 -21st NSF & the Irorun Agbe Ayo-Olopon Championship Ogbomosho.
This state of affairs does not lend itself for recording results of a tournament for posterity. It does not aid the cause of post tournament marketing to further popularise the game. It does not enable the construction of a ranking system of players based on competition performances.
I will advise tournament organisers to consider these points and review the tournament management format. Adopting a Round Robin or Swiss System format will enable players to be ranked easily. These formats also lend themselves well to managing tournaments using computer paring software, which produce pairings & reports (results) instantaneously. These reports can then be posted to the players, whom ever it may interest, websites & social media platforms. I will that in the year to come & subsequent years this advice will be heeded. Such that the end of a competition will not be the end of promoting the game.