By Diane Royston, Sunday Women’s League Vice President
ALTA has rules to govern play on the court and rules to keep our lineups legal. Some are very clear, but some cause a bit of confusion. During the season, we get many questions regarding what a “forfeit” is and what a “default” is, and how they are different.
A forfeit is the result of a violation of ALTA rules — typically, an illegal player or illegal player movement. A default occurs when players are not present for their match. The resulting penalties can be similar: loss of points from the point of infraction down for any points won.
When talking about defaults, how this penalty is assessed also depends on whether it is a rain make-up match, a match played early, or a regularly scheduled dual meet. Let’s take each situation separately.
During a regularly scheduled dual meet, defaults must be taken from the lowest line. If a higher position is defaulted, any win at a lower position(s) will be forfeited. Lines played for a rain make-up may be played out of order; therefore, a default that occurs at a higher line will not cause all lower lines to be defaulted, as it does in a regular match.
If a match is played early, normal default rules apply, so any default at the higher lines would cause points to be taken for lower line wins.
What constitutes illegal player movement? An illegal player movement violation occurs either by moving a player higher or lower than ALTA rules permit, otherwise known “sandbagging.”
A single player is permitted to move up or down two lines from their last legal position. A pair of players can move only one position up or down from where they played their last legal position as a pair. Should players move outside these parameters, it is considered an illegal move, and the team will be charged with a forfeit and will lose that point, as well as any points won below that position.
Another illegal movement would involve sandbagging, which is when a winning pair is moved down, and a losing pair is moved up. This rule applies only during the regular season and applies even if the pair of players have only played together one time. When determining what a winning pair is, the record of all match play is taken into consideration, not just the last time the pair played together. If a pair of players played L4 and won in week one, L3 and won in week two, played L2 in week three and lost, they would still be considered a winning pair because their overall record was 2-1. A pair of players who have lost more matches than they have won is a losing pair. And if a pair that has won as many matches as they lost, they have no losing or winning record.
If this pair were moved down and a losing pair moved above them, that would be considered sandbagging, and the team would lose the point at the line played as well as any points won below that line.
Forfeits will also be assessed if an ineligible player is on the scorecard. An ineligible player is one who is not on the roster. When this happens, the team will lose that point and any points won below the line the ineligible person played.
ALTA provides tools to assist captains in determining legal lineups, including the Tracking Sheet and the Line Up Checker. Utilize those tools to avoid losing points unnecessarily!
