Rob Chilton’s piece in Esquire Middle East explores the exploding popularity of padel tennis in the United Arab Emirates (UAE):
A few years ago, if you’d said that one of your hobbies was padel, people would have thought you were referring to stand up paddleboarding. Mention padel now, however, and it’s highly likely you’ll get a beaming smile of recognition followed by an enthusiastic description of a rally they saw in a professional match on YouTube that morning (Google ‘insane padel rallies’ and you’ll see what I mean).
Padel is the hottest thing to happen to racquet sports since Rafa Nadal’s mahogany biceps. A high-energy hybrid of squash and tennis, padel is played on a court surrounded by reinforced glass walls and is all about deftness of touch, chasing rebounds, playing the angles, and guiding the ball into corners to make it awkward for your opponent to return the ball. If tennis is the equivalent of a five-day cricket Test match, padel is the Twenty20 Big Bash League.
Kite Beach, Al Quoz, Emirates Golf Club, JLT, Ripe Market, Jumeirah Golf Estates… padel courts have been popping up all over Dubai in the last three years. Yet the sport’s astonishing popularity in Dubai means that, despite the growing number of clubs, it’s easier to book a table at Zuma on Saturday night than it is to find an available padel court. Drive past any padel club – even late at night – and you’ll see a flurry of activity as players get their fix of this addictive game.
I took up padel because I was becoming increasingly frustrated by playing – and failing at – tennis. What looks easy on TV when Rafa and Roger exchange ground strokes is maddeningly difficult in real life as a court with large dimensions, tramlines and baselines results in minuscule room for error. Padel, however, is easy to learn and you can improve quickly because the absence of lines (apart from when serving) means a mishit backhand goes unpunished thus allowing players more freedom to experiment with their shots.