The essentials
Six players fills exactly one court: four play, two sit out. You never have to manage the bench yourself — the app picks who sits out based on who has played the least, so everyone ends the evening with almost exactly the same number of matches.
The timing is easy to estimate. A round to 24 points takes 15–20 minutes including the changeover. Five rounds therefore take 75–100 minutes — perfect for a ninety-minute booking — while the full seven-round schedule takes 105–140 minutes and deserves a two-hour slot.
The schedule
The table below is an actual run of PadelFlow's americano engine: seven rounds with six players on one court. The right-hand column shows who sits out — follow it round by round to see how the bench rotates.
| Round | Court 1 | Sits out |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Anna + Bruno vs Carla + David | Emma and Felix |
| 2 | Emma + Anna vs Felix + Bruno | Carla and David |
| 3 | Carla + Emma vs David + Felix | Anna and Bruno |
| 4 | Anna + Carla vs Bruno + David | Emma and Felix |
| 5 | Emma + Bruno vs Felix + Anna | Carla and David |
| 6 | Carla + David vs Emma + Felix | Anna and Bruno |
| 7 | Anna + David vs Bruno + Carla | Emma and Felix |
Seven matches means 28 player slots shared between six players — it can't divide evenly, but it gets as close as the arithmetic allows:
| Player | Matches played | Rounds on the bench |
|---|---|---|
| Anna | 5 | 2 |
| Bruno | 5 | 2 |
| Carla | 5 | 2 |
| David | 5 | 2 |
| Emma | 4 | 3 |
| Felix | 4 | 3 |
Nobody is ever more than one match behind anyone else, and the bench rotates strictly: nobody sits out twice before everyone has sat out once.
The rotation
The americano engine builds every round for maximum variety: repeated partners are avoided first, repeated opponents second, and play time is balanced last. In the schedule above that gives Anna and Bruno all five possible partners over the evening, and 13 of the 15 possible partner pairs make it onto court. Only one pair repeats — Carla and David partner in both round 1 and round 6 — because the arithmetic with two players benched each round never works out perfectly.
The bench is not a fixed order but a product of the stats: the players with the fewest matches played go on court first, and on a tie, whoever has sat out the most takes priority. That is why the same pair can sit out twice before the cycle evens out — like Emma and Felix in rounds 1 and 4 — without anyone ever falling more than one match behind the rest.
The results never affect the pairings. The points you enter — every match runs to 24 — only count in the leaderboard that crowns the evening's winner. That is the whole difference from mexicano, where the standings decide who meets in the next round.
Add one more pair and everything divides: with 8 players you fill two courts, nobody sits out, and everyone gets a new partner in all seven rounds — the same holds for 12 and 16. The rules, point variants and a complete worked example are on the americano page, and if you want this schedule with your own names in it, the americano generator builds it in under a minute.
FAQ
As many as you have time for — rounds are generated one at a time, so you decide when the evening ends. With 6 players a full bench cycle completes every three rounds, and after six rounds everyone has played exactly four matches. Five to seven rounds is typical for a booking of ninety minutes to two hours.
Allow 15–20 minutes per round: one match to 24 points plus the changeover. Five rounds therefore take 75–100 minutes and fit a ninety-minute booking, while seven rounds take 105–140 minutes — book two hours if you want to play the full schedule above.
Yes — as even as the arithmetic allows. The bench is picked by matches played: whoever has played the fewest goes on court first, and on a tie, whoever has sat out the most takes priority. Nobody is ever more than one match behind anyone else — after seven rounds, four players have played five matches and two have played four.
Yes. Americano in PadelFlow works from 4 to 32 players on 1–8 courts. With 8, 12 or 16 players the arithmetic works out perfectly: everyone plays every round and nobody sits out. With odd counts like 9 the bench rotates just like here — the difference in matches played never exceeds one.
No. In americano the points only count in the leaderboard — the next round is built from who has played, sat out and partnered, never from the score. If you would rather have the standings decide the courts, mexicano is the format for that.
Ready?
Open the generator right in the browser and type in your six names — free, no signup, and the next round takes care of itself. Prefer an app? PadelFlow is on the App Store.
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