There’s just one more event left on the 2023-2024 PSA World Tour season, with the Xbox PSA World Tour Finals taking place in Bellevue, USA from June 18 to June 22.
The season-ending event will be held at the Boys and Girls Club Hidden Valley Field House. The tournament is unique compared to other events on the PSA World Tour calendar, in that the top eight players over the course of the campaign have had to qualify for it by amassing points available at every World Tour event. Spots could also be guaranteed after winning either the World Championships or Platinum-level tournaments.
The Groups
Those eight players have then been split into two groups, with one of each of the 1/2, 3/4, 5/6 and 7/8 seeding brackets allocated into each group. In the group stages, each player will play the other three members of their group over the three days of group stage action, with the top two from each group going through to the semi-finals.
The Semis
The winners of Group A will face the runners-up of Group B, and vice versa, before the winners of those matches face off in the final,
The entirety of the group stages and the semi-finals will be played as best-of-three, the finals are best-of-five.
Group Standings
The final standings of each group shall be determined by the first of the following methods that apply:
- Greatest number of points
- Greatest number of wins
The points scoring format is as follows:-
If two players are tied, the tie will be broken by:
- Head-to-head result
- If the two players do not have a head-to-head result, the tie will be broken by the highest percentage of points won.
If three players are tied, the tie will be broken by:
- The highest percentage of points won
If ties still exist after the above procedures, player will be positioned in ascending order according to their seeding.
Any final round robin match that is not completed will result in a straight game win or loss.
Example Scenarios
For instance, in Group B, New Zealand’s Paul Coll will play Egypt’s Mazen Hesham and Tarek Momen, along with World Champion Diego Elias, across the group stages. The top two from that group will then move through to face the top two from Group A.
If Coll was to top the group, he would then face the man who came second in Group A, with the winner of Group A facing the runner-up of Group B. The tournament then becomes a straight knockout, with the winners of the semi-finals facing off in the final on Saturday June 22 to see who will claim the Xbox PSA World Tour Finals crowns.
Sudden Death
If in any of the matches the score reaches 10-10, instead of a tiebreak situation happening where a player usually has to win by two clear points, sudden death will take place. This is where the player who wins the next point to lead 11-10 will win the game.
The Groups
All of the action will be available to watch live on SQUASHTV with live scores available to followhere. For more information on the Xbox PSA World Tour Finals, visit the offical tournament website or follow the PSA on X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and WhatsApp.