Operations research transforms the scheduling of chilean soccer leagues and south American world cup qualifiers

Abstract

For the past 12 years, the Chilean Professional Soccer Association (ANFP) hasapplied operations research (OR) techniques to schedule soccer leagues in Chile. Usinginteger programming-based methods, the ANFP decides which matches are played ineach round, taking into account various objectives, such as holding down costs and ensur-ing engaging tournaments for the fans. It has scheduled more than 50 tournaments usingthis approach, resulting in an estimated direct economic impact of about $59 million,including reductions in television broadcaster operating costs, growth in soccer pay-television subscriptions, increased ticket revenue, and lower travel costs for the teams. Thisapplication of OR has also had significant noneconomic impacts. First, the incorporationof team requirements and various sporting criteria has improved process transparencyand schedule fairness, increasing fans’ interest in local professional tournaments; second,because of the high portability of these techniques, they have been used successfullyto schedule sports leagues in other countries (examples include volleyball and basket-ball in Argentina, and the South American qualifiers for the 2018 Soccer World Cup).Furthermore, the models and methods used in this scheduling application have beendisseminated widely, helping to promote OR as an effective tool for addressing practicalproblems. Our outreach activities have reached thousands of high school and universitystudents in four countries and a more general audience of millions of television viewersand Internet users.