Five, six, seven, nine: running padel when it is not a multiple of four

Padel needs players in fours and groups arrive in fives and sevens. The fix is two rules and one number, and most organisers only ever apply the first rule.

The first rule: rotate on games played

Pick who plays by fewest games played so far, with one override on top: anybody who sat out the last round goes on first, regardless. Two consecutive rests is the thing people actually resent, and counting games alone does not prevent it — with seven players on one court the counts stay so close that the same person can easily be picked out twice running.

1. 1

   Everyone who rested last round goes on

   Non-negotiable, and it is checked before anything else. This alone removes most complaints.
2. 2

   Fill remaining seats by fewest games played

   Among everybody else, whoever has played least gets the next seat. Break ties at random rather than alphabetically, or the same name sits out every time.
3. 3

   Only then apply the format

   Once you know who is on, the format decides the pairings — by standing for Mexicano, by unused partnership for Americano. Fairness decides participation; the format decides matchups. Never the other way round.

The second rule: pay people for resting

This is the half almost nobody applies. If your leaderboard is built from points and a resting player scores nothing, then the rota is deciding the standings. Over eight rounds with seven players on one court, some players will have played five rounds and others three — a two-round gap that no amount of good play can close.

So give whoever sits out compensation points: half the round's target is the standard choice, which is 10 or 11 in a round to 21. The options in practice:

Which numbers actually work

Some group sizes rotate beautifully and some do not, and it comes down to arithmetic. An Americano rotation divides evenly when the partnerships it needs split cleanly into the two per court each round supplies. On one court that means 4, 5, 8, 9, 12 and 13 come out exact — a multiple of four, or one more — and 6, 7, 10 and 11 do not.

Every one of those rosters has a published rotation in the Americano generator, including the awkward ones — each says how many repeated pairings it settles for, which is the fewest the engine could find rather than a claim.

Five is a good number, not a problem

Five players on one court is the best-behaved awkward group there is. A complete rotation takes five rounds, every player partners each of the other four exactly once, and every player sits out exactly once. It is a genuinely elegant schedule and it fits inside an hour.

Nine on two courts is the sweet spot

Nine players over two courts rests one person per round — eleven per cent of the time, which nobody notices — and the rotation divides exactly at nine rounds. If you are hovering between eight and ten players for a two-court booking, nine is the better target than either.

Six and seven on one court are the hard ones

Seven players sharing one court means three people watching at any moment and each player sitting out nearly half the rounds. If you can get a second court for part of the session, do. If you cannot, this is the case for King of the Court with a queue, or for shortening the rounds to 16 points so the rotation moves faster and a rest is five minutes rather than eight.

Make the resting round worth something

Sitting out is only dead time if you let it be. A few things that work:

• Give the rester the scoring.One job, it takes ten seconds a round, and it removes the “who is writing this down” problem permanently.
• Rest in pairs where you can. Two people off is a conversation; one person off is standing alone by the fence.
• Shorten the rounds. With a big queue, a 16-point target means people are back on in five or six minutes.
• Say the rota out loud at the start.“Everybody sits out once or twice, nobody twice in a row” sets the expectation before anyone starts counting.

The other way to solve it

All of the above manages a group that is the wrong size. The better fix is to know the size in advance, which is an organising problem rather than a format one: book the seats you have, let people claim them, and put the overflow on a waiting list so a late drop-out is refilled without you brokering it. That is the subject of running a weekly group, and it is worth more than any rotation rule here.