League
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General Information on leagues
A league, also known as competition or serie. All teams in Hattrick play in "leagues". Each league consists of eight (8) different teams, which play against each other two times each season.
There are different league levels, and a certain number of levels for each Hattrick country, depending on the number of users in that specific country. The smallest countries have only three levels, the largest ones, e.g. Spain and Germany have eleven of them, ranging from the first divison (e.g. Bundesliga in Germany or Allsvenskan in Sweden) to the bottom division XI (11). Note that Sweden is a special case when numbering the league levels; the first level is Allsvenskan, then come Ia to Id, then the "second" divisons IIa to IIh, and so on. So, the lowest division in Sweden, the tenth level, is actually called division IX (nine).
League numbers on different levels
There are different numbers of leagues on each level. There is always only one top division league, then there are four second division leagues, 16 third division leagues, and so on, up to the sixth division. From there on, the series size doubles at every second level.
The teams will play their fixtures in the same order every season.
| League level | Number of leagues |
| 1 | 1 |
| 2 | 4 |
| 3 | 16 |
| 4 | 64 |
| 5 | 256 |
| 6 | 1024 |
| 7 | 1024 |
| 8 | 2048 |
| 9 | 2048 |
| 10 | 4096 |
| 11 | 4096 |
League restructuring
Before season 28 (April 2006), the league structure looked like this:
| League level | Number of leagues |
| 1 | 1 |
| 2 | 4 |
| 3 | 16 |
| 4 | 64 |
| 5 | 256 |
| 6 | 1024 |
| 7 | 1024 |
| 8 | 1024 |
| 9 | 1024 |
| 10 | 1024 |
| 11 | 1024 |
This was changed in order to have less divisions, and to solve the bot problem found in many of the larger countries, notably Spain.
Promotion/relegation
In the five highest divisions, promotions and relegations all go in the same way.
A list of all champions in a division is made, the promotionranking. The team which has gained the most points in his league is positioned first, the champion with the least points is placed last (4th for II, 16th for III, 64th for IV, 256th for V). When teams have the same number of points, the tiebraker is goal difference, next goals scored and eventually a draw.
The top half of the champions promote directly and replace the 7th and 8th placed teams in the higher division. The other half of the champions play a qualification match against the numbers 5 and 6 of the division above. The champion which is ranked highest in the bottom half of the promotionranking will play the number 6 with the least point. The lowest ranked champion will play the highest ranked number 5. The teams from the higher division (5th and 6th placed) play at home.
| Higher division | Direct/indirect | Lower division |
| Best ranked no. 5 | plays | Worst ranked no. 1 (64th for IV, 16th for III) |
| 2nd ranked no. 5 | plays | 2nd worst ranked no. 1 (63th for IV, 15th for III) |
| Worst ranked no. 5 (16th for III, 4th for II) | plays | No. 1 (49th for IV, 13th for III) |
| Best ranked no. 6 | plays | No. 1 (48th for IV, 12th for III) |
| Worst ranked no. 6 (16th for III) | plays | Best ranked no. 1 of the bottom half (33th for IV, 9th for III) |
| Best ranked no. 7 | replaced by | Best ranked no. 1 |
| Worst ranked no. 7 | replaced by | No. 1 (16th for IV, 4th for III) |
| Best ranked no. 8 | replaced by | No. 1 (17th for IV, 5th for III) |
| Worst ranked no. 8 | replaced by | Worst ranked no. 1 of the top half (32th for IV, 8th for III |
In this way every division further from the top is 4 times as big as the one above. Out of 4 champions, one replaces a number 7 directly, one a number 8. Another champion will play a qualificationmatch against a number 5 and one champion will play a number 6 in order to try to earn promotion. Qualification matches are only played between the following divisions: I <-> II, II <-> III, III <-> IV, IV <-> V and V <-> VI, in lower divisions there are only direct promotions and relegations.
From division VI down the promotion/relegation varies. For division VI champions and division V 5th to 8th place finishers the same system as described above is used.
In divisiont VI the numbers 5 and 6 don't have to play a qualification match in order to remain in their division. Only the number 7 and 8 are relegated. They are replaced by numbers 1 and 2 from division VII. In division VII the bottom two teams also relegate, but since division VIII is twice as big as division VII, only the champions will promote.
In the divisions below, number 7 and 8 all relegate (exept the bottom division ofcourse). Champions will all promote, numbers 2 will only promote if the division above has as much leagues as theirs, if the division above has half the number of leagues, the numbers 2 will stay in their league.
From division 6 down, divisions wil alternating have the same and double size (see league restructuring).
Distribution For New and Relegated Teams
Hattrick changed the way the leagues are filled with teams, to avoid leagues full of bot teams. This was annaounced in a My Hattrick message on the 15th of July 2008 :
| 2008-07-15 It´s Lonely at the Bottom | |
| We have started distributing rookie teams into the league system in a new way. We hope to improve a few things with this change. One is to make sure teams in lower divisions are not left "alone", without human competition. Two, to make sure that new teams get a more balanced competition (not too hard, and not too easy). The main change will be that rather than filling series up completely, in numerical order, the Hattrick Football Association will start with series that have only one human-owned team. When these have at least four human-owned teams, series with two active teams will follow, and so on. Not packing human-owned teams too tighly will make promotion easier for new, active human owners. Before next season, we will make it impossible for bot teams to promote, instead giving these places to the best available human-owned teams. | |
This was later changed into the following (bold text is changed) :
| 2008-07-15 It´s Lonely at the Bottom | |
| We have started distributing rookie teams into the league system in a new way. We hope to improve a few things with this change. One is to make sure teams in lower divisions are not left "alone", without human competition. Two, to make sure that new teams get a more balanced competition (not too hard, and not too easy). The main change will be that rather than filling series up completely, in numerical order, the Hattrick Football Association will start with series that have only one human-owned team. When these have at least four human-owned teams, series with two active teams will follow, and so on. Not packing human-owned teams too tighly will make promotion easier for new, active human owners. Later on we aim to reduce the possibility for bot teams to promote at the expense of human controlled teams. | |
The rules, in order, for the distribution of teams is as follows :
- Series in the second lowest division with at least one team will get new users up to the amount of four teams starting with the ones with fewest active users.
- Series in the second lowest division without any teams will get new users up to the amount of four teams.
- Series in the lowest division with at least one team will get new users up to the amount of four teams starting with the ones with fewest active users.
- Series in the lowest division without any teams will get new users up to the amount of four teams.
- Series in the lowest division is filled up to full with every series first getting up to 5 teams, every series getting up to 6 teams etc.
