Gamesmanship

Examples of "flow-breaking" methods include:

• In darts, a player intentionally taking a long time to take their darts out of the dartboard
• Feigning injury to delay the game, or reduce advertised ability. The skilled gamesman can counter this tactic by waiting until the game has been in play for some time, before revealing that he or she suffers from a far more serious condition, such as a heart defect.
• In billiards or snooker, intentionally standing in the opponent's line of sight, and then suddenly moving when the opponent is about to shoot under the guise of getting out of their sight line. "More or less at the last moment, leaping into the correct position with exaggerated agility, and stand rigidly with head bowed."[6]
• Distracting the opposing player by complaining about other people who might be (but were not) distracting the opposing player. Potter, who always insisted that the good gamesman must give the appearance of being a good sportsman, recommended this approach. For example, if an opponent is about to take a shot at billiards, it is bad gamesmanship to fidget and whistle but good gamesmanship to distract him by loudly requesting silence from spectators: 'Simulate annoyance, on the opponent's behalf, with the onlookers'.[7]
• When winning a point maintain direct eye contact with opponent, but when losing one always avoid direct eye contact.
• In cricket, coming out to bat with two right-handed gloves and then wasting time sorting out the problem.
• In baseball, a batter disrupting a pitcher's flow by calling a time-out just before he delivers the pitch.
• When losing an outdoor game, feigning a deep, informed and more than amateur interest in e.g. botany or ornithology, in order to convey a breadth of interests and suggest to the opponent that losing is not of concern. This can cause the opponent to relax their attention, or at any rate rob them of the satisfaction of winning. Potter termed this 'the natural hampette...See Gardens for Gamesmen, or When to be Fond of Flowers(15s.)'.[8]
• In amateur ice hockey, intentionally icing the puck, lining up at the wrong face-off dot, or shooting the puck over the glass (in professional hockey, the team that ices the puck is not allowed a line change, while shooting the puck over the glass leads to a two-minute penalty).
• In tennis when serving taking a long time between serves and making the receiver wait or when receiving, getting in position in such a way that the server is distracted, or taking a medical time out when your opponent is experiencing a successful run.[9]
• In rugby league:
  • Taking too long to pack down in a scrum, thus wasting time;
  • Taking too long to take to the field before a match or after half-time, thus forcing the opposition team to wait for a prolonged period before the match starts or resumes.
• In American football, calling a time out the instant before a game-winning or game-tying field goal or PAT to break the normal flow of play. This is known as "icing" or "freezing" the kicker.
• In sprint running events, taking too long to settle in the starting-blocks, inducing other competitors to commit a false-start[10]

Examples of methods designed to cause the opponent to overthink or to not take the game seriously enough include:

• Giving intentionally vague advice in the hope of making the opponent focus on his play. In such "Advicemanship", 'the advice must be vague, to make certain it is not helpful', although Potter also noted that 'according to some authorities the advice should be quite genuine and perfectly practical'.[11]
• Asking one's opponent's advice for a (fictitious) match the following day, against an implied stronger opponent.
• Claiming that the game being played "just isn't my sport", or claiming less expertise than the player actually possesses (a mild form of hustling).
• In American football, the very common practice of taking one or more timeouts to give an opposing kicker an excessive amount of time to think about a critical kick; most often a field goal or extra point but sometimes a potential on-side kick. The intent is to cause the kicker to get overly stressed about making a mistake and hopefully create a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is commonly referred to as "icing the kicker." A common variant of this strategy is to attempt to call the timeout right before the ball is snapped, so that there is not enough time to stop the play and the opposing kicker has to attempt the same kick twice.
• "Icing" is also used, albeit less frequently, in basketball. In late-game situations with a player shooting free throws, it is not uncommon for the opposing team to take a timeout. This is commonly referred to as "icing the shooter".
• The converse approach, suggesting a level of expertise far higher than the player actually possesses, can also be effective. For example, although gamesmanship frowns on simple distractions like whistling loudly while an opponent takes a shot, it is good gamesmanship to do so when taking a shot oneself, suggesting as it does a level of carefree detachment which the opponent does not possess.

• If the players personally know and/or have experience with each other, lies and other conversation topics can be used. In wrestling or many combat sports, it could be targeting a limb which the opponent has been carrying an injury.

Examples of intentional "mistakes" designed to gain an advantage:

• In bridge, intentionally misdealing and then engaging in chaotic bidding, knowing that the hand will be void anyway, in the hope that 'opponents will…be unable to form a working judgement of the opponents' bidding form'.[12]
• In poker, intentionally raising out of turn, to induce players to give a free card.
• In baseball, intentionally dropping a caught ball, to create a force play on the baserunners (hence the infield fly rule).

All of the above are considered very close to cheating, and the abuser of gamesmanship techniques will find himself penalized in most serious sports and games tournaments, as well as being deemed (if caught) a "bad sport".

The rules of the International Defensive Pistol Association for its practical shooting matches specifically state that any illegal action taken with the intent of gaining a competitive advantage is penalized as a "Failure to Do Right", adding 20 seconds to the competitor's time. This penalty is rarely given, partly because of its highly subjective nature.