GB Head Coach John Leach has admitted that his side have been drawn in the DP World Padel Championships Group of Death after the draw was made in Dubai this afternoon at 4pm UK time.
The Brit Boys were placed in Group A, alongside World Champions Spain, seventh ranked Uruguay and the tournament’s dark horses Portugal who beat the Brits in the European Qualifiers at Derby last month.
All of which left Leach to admit his men will face a mountain climb yet the bullish British coach has vowed that Team GB will come out with all guns blazing for their first match on Monday.
While with the identity of their opening rivals due to be announced tomorrow along with all of the first-round fixtures Leach will hold of making his selection for the opener until the opposition is known.
A sanguine Leach said: “We will give it everything but you have to hold your hands up and say this is the toughest of the four groups by a distance and something of a Group of Death.
“Obviously you have Spain who are the World Champions, Uruguay who are always in the top eight and there or thereabouts and then of course Portugal who beat us in the play-offs at Derby and were without doubt the toughest draw possible side from the fourth pot.
“But we will go out to enjoy it and give it our best and see how it goes. I will pick our strongest line-up and the players just want to get going and one thing is for sure we will give it our best.
“What we have to do is make sure whoever faces us on Monday gets the very best Team GB they can meet lining up against them and performing at the top of our games.”
With the opening fixtures not announced until tomorrow Leach says he will hold off with his selection until after a final Sunday training session: “Usually the fixture list for Monday’s schedule will come out tomorrow. But we are third seeds in the group and I think that will make it either Spain or Uruguay at either 3pm or 6pm local time.
“We will train tomorrow and we will find who the opening match is and I will make my selection either tomorrow night or Monday morning.
“But with it being the opening match that will set the tone for the group games and we will be throwing everything at it and be determined to get the best possible start that we can no matter who we are playing.”
There is no doubt that there was distinctly no pot luck for the Brits with reigning champions and No.1 seeds Juan Lebron and Ale Galan inspired Spain, who have won the World Championship on four occasions, the short-odds favourites to retain their title.
Uruguay have won a record number of six bronze medals at the World Championships while the Team GB no all about the Miguel Oliveira inspired Portuguese who dumped a highly-fancied Swedish side out of the qualifiers at Derby before swatting aside Leach’s men to book their tickets for Dubai.
Of the other qualifiers from Derby the Netherlands have been drawn in Group B alongside World Championship runners-up from last time Argentina and a highly rated Italy side with Belgium the third seeds in the pool.
Meanwhile GB ace Nikhil Mohindra revealed that as the draw unfolded there was a case of mixed emotions in the GB team room which also included LTA Head of Padel Tom Murray.
Mohindra, who at 21- years-old, is the youngest player in the squad, said: “We all watched it live together and it could not be harder, it really is the Group of Death. But at the same time there is real excitement that we will be testing ourselves against the best players in the world in Juan Lebron and Ale Galan.
“We have to be realistic in that we know how good Spain are but we also believe we have a chance against Uruguay and also Portugal.
“I would say our biggest hope is against Uruguay and we know that if we can beat them or Portugal we will automatically qualify for the next World Championships.
“If we lose all our matches then we would need to qualify again and that is the one thing we don’t want to have to go through.”
When it came to how he would prefer the cards to fall Mohindra wants to start with the best before the rest: “From my perspective I’d want to play Spain first. It doesn’t get harder than against the world champions and No.1 rated side and if we can produce a good level against them it will give us a strong platform against the other two sides.
“But I also think we will have a chance against Portugal, we played them in Derby, we know what their lay-out and tactical set ups will be and I think we did enough to let them know they were in a match.
“So we have to use all of that against them and make sure it gives us the result we need.”
Meanwhile in the ladies draw the Carolina Navarro inspired Swedish side, who knocked the GB Ladies out of the world qualifiers at Derby, have been drawn in Group D with France, Brazil, Paraguay, and the UAE.
