Padel is rapidly gaining popularity across the world. Recreational as well as professional athletes are becoming fans of this sport. Our country is no exception to this worldwide fad. Serbian sports enthusiasts are becoming increasingly fond of the new sport. So, the first padel tournament in Serbia took place last weekend on Ada Ciganlija.
Our company is full of sports enthusiasts. Four of them were brave enough to enter this padel tournament. One pair played under the name Epicss.io, while the other one took the name of our pet project—the sports betting app BatWinner.app. Unfortunately, it looks like we need a bit more practice. We finished the competition early on. Still, we are glad we took part and gave our contribution to the popularisation of this entertaining sport.
Padel officially arrived in Serbia last year thanks to great people from VamosPadel. The sport attracted our attention the moment it arrived and we became fans after the first game. This season, we have already squeezed in a few matches before the tournament took place. Although we weren’t too successful in the competition, we aren’t planning on giving up this “extracurricular” activity since it helps us build a stronger and more connected team.
In case you haven’t heard about padel so far, check out a few facts about this sport below.
Padel is a mix of tennis, squash, and badminton. Padel court is the same as the one for tennis, but with a hard surface enclosure. The racquet also differs from the tennis racquet. It’s smaller, lighter, and has a compact surface with small holes on it. Since it’s stringless, it’s more of a bat than a racquet.
The forerunner of padel was a variation of tennis. It was called platform tennis and it has been played since the 1910s in the UK and the US. Enrique Corcuera, a Mexican businessman, was a fan of platform tennis. So, one day in 1969, he decided to adapt his Acapulco holiday home’s tennis court into a court for this sport. That’s how he, partly inadvertently, created padel in today’s form.
Corcuera soon showed his new invention to his friend, Prince Alfonso of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. Alfonso loved it so much that in 1974 he decided to build a couple of padel courts in Marbella, Spain. Over time, minor changes were made to the game to make it more competitive, but the essence stayed the same.
Padel arrived in Argentina in a similar way—via Alfonso’s friend, Julio Menditeguy. He learned of the sport in Marbella and was so impressed that he imported it into his home country.
It took some 25 years for padel to spread throughout Spain. At the beginning of this millennium, it was a well-established and loved sport. In 2005, several Padel Associations started the International Championship, Padel Pro Tour. It took place on Spanish soil and went on until 2012.
As of 2010, padel has been growing and catching the attention of more and more recreational athletes. It has been dubbed “the fastest growing sport in the world”. In recent times, its popularity has increased in the UK and Scandinavian countries.
As a successor to Padel Pro Tour, World Padel Series was founded in 2013. This competition gathers the best padel players around the world. World Padel Series is equivalent to ATP and WTA tours in tennis.
There are also talks of padel becoming an Olympic sport. However, it needs to gain even more international popularity. To qualify for an Olympic sport, padel needs to reach the sportspeople of at least 75 countries. For now, it is played in 57 countries.
So, padel has a bright future as a pro sport. It is, nonetheless, certain that it will remain a loved recreational activity among the growing number of sports enthusiasts. Padel is easy to learn and immensely fun. Anyone can play it, so amateurs around the world have yet to be grasped by padel fever.
We hope that the interest in this sport will take root in our country and that this first padel tournament in Serbia is an important milestone in the history of our national sport scene. Don’t forget to try this game—you will surely become a fan. Also, keep up with VamosPadel for the upcoming padel tournaments. In the meantime, we will surprise you with another sports-related app soon, so stay tuned!
