Is UK Padel in Safe Hands?
There is a burning question at the forefront of many a padel lover’s mind in the UK - is the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) the appropriate governing body to allow padel to flourish?
In this blog I will briefly explain the role of sporting governing bodies, outline the positives and negatives of padel under the LTA, examine how padel is governed in similar markets where padel is thriving; Sweden, Italy, Belgium and France and finally, come to a (sort of) conclusion.
What does a Sport Governing Body Do?
If you’re like me before I joined a sports based company, you may not fully understand the function of a national governing body (NGB). In England, Sport England (SE) is the umbrella organisation under which most sporting governing bodies sit. SE is an ‘arms-length body of government responsible for growing and developing grassroots sports’. In short, they’re funded by the government and the National Lottery. Each year SE invests £250m into growing grassroots sport, they do this by funding individual NGB’s.
Some of the sporting governing bodies under SE include England and UK Athletics, Badminton England, Rugby Football Union (RFU), England Squash, The Football Association (FA) and of course, the LTA.
Padel x LTA Strengths
They’re well funded
In 2022 the LTA received 10.2 million from SE and the National Lottery
Governing a mainstay sport isn’t cheap. In the LTA’s case it requires a large payroll (in 2023 they had 326 employees), capital grants to improve facilities, marketing campaigns, running a high performance programme, staging events and more.
They’re well established and have a tonne of experience.
They have governed tennis since 1888. To get a grasp of the sheer length of time they’ve been around, that's the same year as the Jack the Ripper murders.
Longevity brings with it a huge network - this network, particularly the longstanding connections with local councils is crucial for grassroots development.
They have a strong coaching pathway
Their coaching pathways are a very good foundation for introducing padel to the UK.
Their ‘Level 2 Training’ is still relatively basic compared to what’s on offer in Spain and and other well established markets but that’s fine for now - high level coaching isn’t in high demand.
Padel x LTA negatives
There’s a clear conflict of interest
It’s the LTA, not the LPA. Their primary focus will always be to grow tennis.
The first line of their ‘Padel Development Plan 2020-2023’ is to ‘integrate padel into the fabric of tennis in Britain’. As a padel lover this opener doesn’t fill me with confidence.
Two ‘substitutable’ sports
Padel and tennis can be described as ‘substitutable’ sports. Take cricket and athletics, other than the throwing action in some athletic disciplines, there is little overlap - people aren’t likely to swap one for the other.
Whilst UK tennis participation is well established, padel participation is still nascent. Due to their similarities there’s a real risk of ‘sport substitution’.
Governing padel (a new sport)
The LTA, like tennis, has been around for close to 150 years. They govern a sport that has been prevalent in the UK for generations.
In 2008 Statista put the number of tennis players at 940,000 compared to 755,000 players in 2023 - it’s not a growing game and hasn’t been for some time.
Padel’s growth is set to explode. In 2011 there was 1 court, in 2019 there were 40 and now in 2024 there are 450 and counting.
How can a large organisation, whose sole purpose has been to govern and promote a traditional mainstay sport, be expected to adapt effectively to the demands of a new, burgeoning sport?
Let’s take a look at some governing body case studies from around the world.
(please note that I have only included countries where the game is still relatively new, similar to the UK. Portugal isn’t in there because there’s very little data available)
Sweden
The Swedish padel market makes for some interesting reading. It has become something of a cautionary tale for investors, but we’re here to talk about governing bodies.
The Swedish Padel Federation is unsurprisingly a standalone entity, completely unrelated to tennis. In 2022 they had 220 associated centres (of a total of 1050) and 50,000 active members. There were a total of 421,000 unique padel players down from 540,000 in 2021 (undoubtedly a result of padel being one of the only activities on offer during covid). They have 1 court for every 2,500 swedes - the only country comparable with market leader Spain.
Padel is bigger than tennis in Sweden so it makes sense that they have a separate governing body. We’re still a long way off this point in the UK.
ItalY
Italians love padel, with their climate and rich tennis history it’s easy to see why. Behind Spain and Sweden they have the third most courts of any country sitting at 8,520.
The Italian Tennis Federation became the Italian Tennis and Padel federation and now encompasses both sports. As of 2023 there are 3,777 centres, it’s unclear how many are associated with the governing body. They have over 600,000 players and 1 court for every 7,000 italians.
Italy and the Italian Tennis and Padel Federation are an example of what the LTA could look like should they decide to get behind padel as a sport in its own right.
Belgium
Belgian Padel is made up of two regional governing bodies, Padel Wallonia-Brussels dedicated solely to padel and Tennis Padel Flanders (TPF) which governs the two sports. Naturally the former's objective is to see padel grow, the latter wants to ‘secure an equal place for padel in the sports landscape’.
As of 2023 they have 1,752 courts, that’s 1 court for every 6,600 Belgians. Associated with the two governing bodies they have 416 centres - it’s unclear how many of the total courts this amounts to but it’s safe to say that it makes up at least 50%.
Belgian padel appears to be in a very good place. Crucially, both governing bodies are committed to seeing padel, as well as tennis in TPF’s case, succeed.
France
The final case study, and by far the hardest to decipher, is France. Home to Roland Garros, France is most similar to the UK with its storied tennis and grand slam heritage. It’s also similar to the UK in that padel is still governed by a tennis body, the Tennis Federation of France.
There are 787 clubs and over 2000 courts all associated with the Federation. That amounts to 1 padel court for every 34,000 people.
Their aim is to ‘promote, organise and develop tennis, para-tennis, beach tennis, padel, court tennis and pickleball’. With 6 sports on their roster it’s unsurprising that they trail behind all the other countries mentioned in this article.
Takeaways
The numbers in Belgium, Sweden and Italy make for envious reading. France, whilst still streets ahead of us, isn’t quite so rosy. The first three all have governing bodies that are solely or dually set on the success of padel.
Here in the UK we have only 450 courts. For every padel court there are almost 150,000 Brits. To put it bluntly, we’re struggling. Padel needs all the help it can get and that starts with a committed governing body.
In 2019 the LTA first took the helm of UK padel. Five years on, it has become evident that something needs to give. Either, like in Italy, the LTA adapts dramatically to push padel and tennis equally or, like in Sweden and Belgium, a new governing body must take its place.
Here at PPUK, we would love to learn and discuss this topic more in the hopes of bringing about changes in UK padel governance. If you are of a similar mind please reach out to george@padelprojectuk.com
