JavaScript is disabled
Our website requires JavaScript to function properly. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser settings before proceeding.
In team sports, the term home advantage – also called home ground, home field, home-field advantage, home court, home-court advantage, defender's advantage or home-ice advantage – describes the benefit that the home team is said to gain over the visiting team. This benefit has been attributed to psychological effects supporting fans have on the competitors or referees; to psychological or physiological advantages of playing near home in familiar situations; to the disadvantages away teams suffer from changing time zones or climates, or from the rigors of travel; and in some sports, to specific rules that favor the home team directly or indirectly. In baseball, in particular, the difference may also be the result of the home team having been assembled to take advantage of the idiosyncrasies of the home ballpark, such as the distances to the outfield walls; most other sports are played in standardized venues.
The term is also widely used in "best-of" playoff formats (e.g., best-of-seven) as being given to the team that is scheduled to play one more game at home than their opponent if all necessary games are played.In many sports, such designations may also apply to games played at a neutral site, as the rules of various sports make different provisions for home and visiting teams. In baseball, for instance, the team designated the home team bats second in each inning, whereas the "visiting" team bats first.

View More On Wikipedia.org
Back Top