Results of the Monte-Carlo sampling of 5 000 000 Jupiter-sized planets on circular orbits around α Cen A. Panel a: fraction of samples (in percent) that end up at a certain apparent separation and polarised intensity contrast at all times. Panel b: full performance map for a certain detection threshold Nτ. This figure shows the probability of detecting an existing planet for all separations and contrasts with an S/N of N. Panels c and d: combination of the likelihood and the performance map gives the fraction of planets at each separation and contrast that are detected as either S∕N = 5 or S∕N = 3 signals depending on the detection threshold.