Tournament software for the volunteerwho runs the tournament
Most amateur tournaments in the Netherlands still run on a spreadsheet, a group chat and a pile of payment requests. PlayTour was built to take that work over: entries, entry fees, the draw, the playing schedule and results in one system.
Why PlayTour exists
Running a club tournament is enjoyable work with an unpleasant core. The sport is the easy part; the evenings before it go on retyping entry lists, working out who can play when, puzzling a playing schedule together and chasing entry fees. That work is identical at every sports club and in every sport, and yet everybody starts again from scratch.
PlayTour takes that part over. What is left is what it was about: a hall full of people playing.
Who we build it for
For the tournament committee of three. For the volunteer who fits it around a job and a Saturday match of their own. For the treasurer who does not want to remind thirty people about seven euros fifty one more time. And for the player, who really only wants to know one thing: what time on Sunday, and on which court.
That runs from a club championship with forty entrants to an open tournament lasting a week, and from tennis and padel to darts, chess, bowls and a 10 kilometre road race. Not for a federation with a competitions department, very much for the club where that department is one shared folder and a group chat.
What tournament software has to solve
The work is not in the matches, it is around them. Four things cost almost every organising committee the most time, and they are exactly the four a computer does better than a person at eleven at night:
- Managing entries, with pairs and teams that arrive half complete.
- Keeping track of who has paid the entry fee and who has not.
- Making the draw and a playing schedule that fits the courts you have, at the times they are free.
- Telling everybody something has changed, and doing it again when it changes again.
There is something else on top of that which rarely appears in a feature list: calm. When the entries, the money and the schedule live in one system there is one version of the truth, and nobody discovers on the morning itself that two schedules are in circulation.
What we hold to
Six principles. They are here not because they sound good, but because each of them cost us something: for every one, there is a feature we did not build.
Built for volunteers
The people running a tournament with this are not tournament directors. They do it a few times a year, usually in the evening, and nobody trained them.
- Workable without a manual beside you
- A mistake can be put right, it is not fatal
- Roles, so not everybody can reach everything
- Sensible defaults, settings only where needed
One model for every sport
Everywhere you look, a tournament is entrants, a format and a way of counting. What differs is the settings, not the software.
- A new sport is a setting, not a project
- If yours is missing, we add it
- Usually within a few days
Every feature removes work
The question about anything new is not whether it looks good, but what work it saves a volunteer. If there is no answer to that, it does not go in.
- Rather not build it than build it halfway
- No screen that only displays something
- No setting where a default will do
No figures without a source
There is no user count on this site, no growth percentage and no customer story from somebody who does not exist. What is here can be checked.
- The tournament list is what is really on it
- The sports list is what really works
- Where something is missing, we say so
The data stays with the club
Every sports club is fully separated from every other. A club sees its own players, its own tournaments and its own money, and nothing else.
- No data moving from one club to another
- No player details on this public website
- Every change logged, with who made it
Finished beats plentiful
A tournament is a Saturday that cannot be moved. A feature that is ninety per cent there is a problem on that Saturday, not a feature.
- Five things that work beat fifteen that nearly do
- What is here has been through a real match day
- What is not finished is not on the site
One platform for every sport
A tennis tournament, a padel tournament, a darts tournament, a chess tournament, a football tournament and a 10 kilometre road race are the same model in PlayTour, configured differently. A tournament everywhere is entrants, a format and a way of counting; what differs is the settings rather than the software. So a club does not have to wait for somebody to build in “your sport”.
The difference comes down to two dials. The format decides how people progress: groups, knockout with or without a losers round, double knockout, a Swiss system where each round follows from the last, or a mass start for running, cycling and triathlon. The way of counting decides what a result is: adding up points, sets and games, counting down as in darts, time, distance or height, judges’ marks, placing, or against par. Set those two correctly and the sport works, including the first time anybody runs it on PlayTour.
The benefit of that is practical rather than technical: a multi-sport club runs its tennis tournament, its card evening and its junior quadrathlon in the same system, with the same sign-in and the same way of working.
What we deliberately do not do
No social network, no finding a partner, no leaderboards and no timeline. PlayTour does one thing: entry to result, without anybody keeping a spreadsheet. Anything that does not contribute to that makes the product bigger rather than better.
That is not modesty, it is maintenance. Every feature added has to keep working on the Saturday it matters, and a product that does everything a little does nothing well enough to hang a tournament on.
How PlayTour is built
PlayTour is three parts sharing one platform: this website, where you find tournaments and read what is on; the web application where clubs set their tournaments up and run them; and the app for players, with your entries, your playing schedule and a notification when something moves. All of it is in Dutch and English.
Underneath those three sits a single platform, which is why a change is right everywhere at once. When the desk moves a match, the new time is in the schedule, in the player’s app and in their inbox at the same moment. It is built by a small team who have run tournaments themselves, which shows in the choices: the log exists because somebody once had to explain who had changed that score.
What is in it, and what is deliberately not
The left column is what PlayTour does today. The right one is not a list of plans, it is a list of things we are not going to build.
What PlayTour does
- Online entries, with pairs and teams confirming themselves
- Tracking what has been paid and what is still outstanding, per entry
- A draw in groups, knockout, double knockout, Swiss system or mass start
- A playing schedule on courts, pitches, tables and halls, across several venues
- Taking account of when a player is unavailable
- Entering results in the way that suits the sport
- Standings, progression and final rankings that update themselves
- Announcements by email and as a notification on the phone
- A role per volunteer, from read-only to full management
- A log of every change, with who made it
What PlayTour does not do
- No social network and no timeline
- No finding a playing partner and no chat between players
- No rankings across clubs
- No advertising between the tournaments
- No data from one club ending up at another
- No feature that exists only because somebody else has it
- No integration we cannot stand behind
What your club can do depends on your plan. The pricing page says what each one includes.
Honest about what is here
This website promises nothing the platform cannot do. The sports in the list are the ones that actually work, the numbers beside the tournaments come straight from the platform, and where something does not exist yet, it says so.
You will not find a user count or a customer story here, because a round number without a source is not an argument. What we can stand behind is in the frequently asked questions.
Wondering whether it suits your club?
Start on the free plan and put one tournament on it. You will find out faster than any product page can tell you.