Editing Promotion and relegation (section)

==Overview==
[[File:Södertälje SK vs Leksands IF, Axa Sports Center 2007-03-22.jpg|thumb|200px|[[Södertälje SK]]-[[Leksands IF]] during a [[2007 Kvalserien]] game.]]
[[File:SVDarmstadt98Aufstieg2015.jpg|thumb|200px|[[SV Darmstadt 98]] fans celebrated promotion to the German [[Bundesliga]] in 2015.]]
[[File:Funeral Procession (5969830903).jpg|thumb|200px|... while [[Preston North End]] fans [[Burial of the Coffin|mourned relegation]] to English [[Football League One|League One]] in 2011.]]

The number of teams exchanged between the divisions is almost always identical. Exceptions occur when the higher division wishes to change the size of its membership, or has lost one or more of clubs (to financial insolvency or expulsion, for example) and wishes to restore its previous membership size, in which case fewer teams are relegated from that division, or (less often) more teams are accepted for promotion from the division below. Such variations usually cause a "knock-on" effect through the lower divisions. For example, in 1995 the [[Premier League]] voted to reduce its numbers by two and achieved the desired change by relegating four teams instead of the usual three, whilst allowing only two promotions from [[Football League Division One]]. Even in the absence of such extraordinary circumstances, the pyramid-like nature of most European sports league systems can still create knock-on effects at the regional level. For example, in a higher league with a large geographical footprint and multiple feeder leagues each representing smaller geographical regions, should most or all of the relegated teams in the higher division come from one particular region then the number of teams to be promoted or relegated from each of the feeder leagues may have to be adjusted, or one or more teams playing near the boundary between the feeder leagues may have to transfer from one feeder league to another to maintain numerical balance.

The system is said to be the defining characteristic of the "European" form of [[professional sports league organization]]. Promotion and relegation have the effect of allowing the maintenance of a hierarchy of leagues and divisions, according to the relative strength of their teams. They also maintain the importance of games played by many low-ranked teams near the end of the season, which may be at risk of relegation. In contrast, the final games of a low-ranked US or Canadian team serve little purpose, and in fact [[tanking (sports)|losing may be beneficial]] to such teams because they offer a better position in the next year's [[draft (sports)|draft]].

Although not intrinsic to the system, problems can occur due to the differing monetary payouts and revenue-generating potential that different divisions provide to their clubs. For example, financial hardship has sometimes occurred in leagues where clubs do not reduce their wage bill once relegated. This usually occurs for one of two reasons: first, the club can not move underperforming players on, or second, the club is gambling on being promoted back straight away and is prepared to take a financial loss for one or two seasons to do so. Some leagues (most notably English football's [[Premier League]]) offer "[[parachute payment (Sports)|parachute payments]]" to its relegated teams for the following year(s).<ref>[http://football.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1837801,00.html "Football"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070310222333/http://football.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1837801,00.html |date=10 March 2007 }}, ''The Guardian''. Article discusses the financial disparity between the Premier League and the Football League]</ref> The payouts are higher than the prize money received by some non-relegated teams and are designed to soften the financial hit that clubs take whilst dropping out of the Premier League. However, in many cases, these parachute payments just serve to inflate the costs of competing for promotion among the lower division clubs as newly relegated teams retain a financial advantage.

In some countries and at certain levels, teams in line for promotion may have to satisfy certain non-playing conditions in order to be accepted by the higher league, such as financial solvency, stadium capacity, and facilities. If these are not satisfied, a lower-ranked team may be promoted in their place, or a team in the league above may be saved from relegation.

While the primary purpose of the promotion and relegation system is to maintain competitive balance, it may also be used as a disciplinary tool in special cases. On several occasions, the
[[Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio|Italian Football Federation]] has relegated clubs found to have been involved in [[match fixing]]. This occurred most recently in 2006, when the season's initial champions [[Juventus FC|Juventus]] were relegated to Serie B, and two other teams were initially relegated but then restored to Serie A after appeal (see [[2006 Serie A scandal]]).

As of the 2020s, empirical evidence increasingly pointed to the conclusion that promotion and relegation, standing alone, was insufficient to ensure adequate parity in any given game or the overall financial performance of a sport (as distinguished from individual players or teams).<ref name="Sindreu">{{cite news |last1=Sindreu |first1=Jon |title=In Sports, American Socialism Is Beating European Capitalism |url=https://www.wsj.com/sports/soccer/in-sports-american-socialism-is-beating-european-capitalism-e6ca0e6a |access-date=October 18, 2024 |work=The Wall Street Journal |date=October 18, 2024 |url-access=subscription}}</ref>  Most importantly, the failure of most [[association football]] leagues to adequately regulate individual player compensation (that is, by imposing [[salary cap]]s) had resulted in too many games ending in predictable [[Blowout (sports)|blowouts]], and thereby reduced the financial value of such games in terms of [[Ticket (admission)|ticket]] sales and [[Broadcasting rights|media rights]].<ref name="Sindreu" /> This explained why in the 2020s, association football leagues were collectively bringing in annually only about two times the revenue of the [[National Football League]] ([[List of professional sports leagues by revenue|the wealthiest sports league in the world]]), even though association football had eight times the number of fans worldwide as [[American football]].<ref name="Sindreu" /> It was reportedly because of such evidence that the [[EuroLeague]] adopted mandatory salary bands in September 2024.<ref name="Sindreu" /> 

===International sport===
Promotion and relegation is used in international sports leagues such as in [[Europe]], and many other parts of the world. It may be used in international sports tournaments. In tennis, the [[Davis Cup]] and [[Billie Jean King Cup]] have promotion and relegation, with a 'World Group' (split into two divisions in the Billie Jean King Cup) at the top and series of regional groups at a lower level. The World Groups in both use a [[knockout tournament]] format, with the first-round losers entering play-offs with winners from regional groups to avoid relegation. In international tournaments, this format allows teams from countries in which a sport is less well established to have competitive matches, while opening up the possibility of competing against higher ranked nations as a sport grows. Other international tournaments which employ promotion and relegation include the [[Ice Hockey World Championships]], [[Bandy World Championship (disambiguation)|Bandy World Championship]]s, [[Men's World Floorball Championship|Floorball World Championships]], the [[UEFA Nations League]], the [[CONCACAF Nations League]], the [[World Cricket League]] and the [[European Athletics Team Championships|European Team Championships]] in athletics.