Americano schedule for 5 players

1 court, 5 rounds, and every player partners every other exactly once. Generated by the same code that runs a live session in the app, so this is the schedule you would actually play.

What a real booking fits

This is one of the few rosters whose entire rotation fits the shortest booking anybody makes. 5 rounds at 21 points is roughly 40 minutes of play, which an hour on court covers with the warm-up.

So the arithmetic runs the other way here: 5 rounds is a short evening, and the fix is a higher point target or more players — 6 is the next roster up.

The rotation

Players are numbered 1 to 5. Hand out the numbers however you like — by arrival, by lot, or by putting your strongest players at opposite ends — because Americano scores individuals, so the numbering carries no seeding.

Why 5 works out evenly

5 is one more than a multiple of four, which is exactly the condition for a rotation with no repeated partner: exactly one player sits each round and the turn comes round evenly.

• One court is all this roster can fill. A second court needs four more players, not a different rotation.
• The player sitting out keeps score for the court they are next on. It is the one job that makes resting feel like part of the game.
• One player short is the 4-player rotation, not a broken version of this one.

Running it

• Read one row at a time. The next round's pairing is fixed before the current one ends, so nobody has to negotiate it on court.
• Every point counts towards the individual, not the pair. Winning 21–14 banks 21 for both players on the winning side and 14 for both on the losing one.
• Play to a fixed point total rather than to games. It is the only way the court finishes on time, and it is why a round count can be promised at all.

The scoring is the part a group chat handles worst. How Americano scoring works covers the rules in full, and the court-time maths covers point targets other than 21.

Other roster sizes

Every roster from 4 to 24 players, each with its own rotation.