The Rules

Each 7-point match awards two separate points, tracked throughout the event:

• 1 point for the match win — awarded to the player who reaches 7 points first.
• 1 point for the PR win — awarded to the player with the lower performance rating (PR) in that match, as evaluated by eXtreme Gammon 2.

A player can therefore earn 0, 1, or 2 points from a single match.

The European Players Cup runs across several BMAB Players Cup legs — Brighton, Aachen, then London, with further cities to be confirmed — culminating in a season final in Budapest.

• Every match at London awards Cup points on the same basis as every other leg: 1 Cup point for the match win, 1 Cup point for the PR win — up to 2 points per match.
• These Cup points accumulate to each player's running European Players Cup season total, carrying toward qualification for the Budapest final.
• At London, the leg's own standings use the same match-win + PR-win totals, so the leg table and the Cup points earned here match.

BMAB London is played as a single 5-round Swiss event — there is no separate knockout stage.

• Players are seeded into strength groups by BMAB grade and rating; Rounds 1–3 are pre-drawn within those groups, so play flows without waiting between rounds.
• Rounds 4 and 5 are drawn on the day from standings by match-win points — PR analysis takes longer than the gap between rounds.
• No player meets the same opponent twice.
• If the field is odd, the tournament director announces how the bye is handled before Round 1.

There is no bracket. After Round 5, the London champion is the player with the most total points — match-win points plus PR-win points — across all five rounds.

• If players are tied on total points, lower average PR across all rounds is ranked higher.
• If PR average is also tied, the placing is shared.

One entry fee of £80 covers tournament direction and the Swiss draw, video recording of every match, transcription, XG analysis, BMAB registration, live results on backgammondata.com, the playing venue, and food served during play.

• Field is capped at 48 participants.
• Optional side pools are offered at the venue on the day, separate from the entry fee.
• Register at londonopen.uk/registration/bmab. Payment is collected by the London Open; places go to the first 48 paid entries. Registration deadline to be announced.

• All matches are played on live boards with clocks, provided by the London Open.
• Match length: 7 points, throughout the tournament.
• Clock: 14 minutes per player and match, plus a 12-second delay per move — this differs from the London Open's own clock settings.
• Play follows WBGF rules; the tournament is registered with BMAB as a qualifier for the European Players Cup, and every match is also UKBGF-rated.
• Matches must be live, clocked, and pre-designated — pairings are published before each round is played, consistent with BMAB's rules for a qualifying tournament.
• Every match is recorded and transcribed by the Backgammon Data team.
• Schedule: 75 minutes per round — R1 11:00, R2 12:15, R3 13:30, R4 14:45, R5 16:00, finish by 17:15. No lunch break; food is served at the venue. Start times may be varied by the tournament director; any decision of the director on timing is final.

All matches are recorded and transcribed by the Backgammon Data team, then submitted to BMAB for analysis. (Note: BMAB's general rules default to splitting transcription between the tournament director and participants — the Backgammon Data team handles all of it instead, so players have nothing to transcribe.)

• Analysis uses eXtreme Gammon's "World Class Analysis" preset with the "Gigantic" search interval, a 15×8 bear-off database, and counts resignation errors toward PR.
• Each match is analysed once.
• Results are published as each match's analysis is completed — pairing doesn't wait on it (see Swiss Pairing, above).

Full detail on BMAB's process: bgmastersab.com/about.