By RJ Mitchell
In part one of an exclusive interview with The Padel Paper, Tom Murray, the LTA’s Head of Padel, has revealed that he believes the sport is ready to explode onto the national sporting consciousness and take a quantum leap to the next level.
Murray, who was appointed three years ago after having previously run British Padel, the fledgling domestic game’s putative organising body back in 2014, believes that padel is at a similar stage to tennis in the UK around 20 years back.
Yet Murray is determined to ensure that padel “walks before it runs” and that a sound infrastructure and flourishing grassroots will be developed in tandem with the already exciting elite cadre of GB international players who are already competing in the sport’s major tournaments like the recent Italy Major held at the Foro Italico.
A man whose passion and excitement for the sport literally bubbles over Murray also candidly admitted that the LTA has ‘opened his mind’ to the possibilities that could await the sport once it is fully launched in the UK.
“As an ex-tennis player it’s easy for me to compare the two sports and I feel padel is where tennis used to be 20 years ago,” said Murray.
The LTA Head of Padel continued: “Back then all of our British players were forced to move to a Florida or Spain but now it is lovely to see the likes of Andy Murray and the entire British squad at the NTC (National Training Centre) training throughout the year, therefore it will be nice if we’re able to get to a similar situation for padel in the future.
“Recently I was in Italy with Christian (Murphy) and Sam (Jones) and it was good to see British players looking to get into the main draw of a major. Players are regularly representing Great Britain in the world of padel and it’s nice to see them continuously out there on tour competing for ranking points.
“But realistically the LTA hasn’t launched padel at all yet, we have simply integrated it so the sport can flourish and grow, which also included a key first step of getting the sport recognised.
“Padel therefore now has a platform and the LTA is committed to facilitating further growth via interest-free loans for facilities for amounts up to £250k, sanctioned tournaments for venues to deliver, and new coaching and officiating courses to grow workforce and opportunities.
“The LTA has big plans to grow padel. However, the next steps are completely aligned to infrastructure, and assurances that there are enough places to play, therefore it is all about going big at the right time.
“What we need to do is to align with tennis and mirror its values, just like we are already seeing in France and Italy whereby padel helps tennis venues that may be struggling and breaking through to attract new audiences while retaining existing audiences, so it is a no brainer.”
Harking back to his previous role as the almost messianic leader of the former British Padel, Murray says he has no doubt the game is at last ready for lift-off: “The most exciting thing is that we are at a stage right now which I have, in all honesty, been waiting to get to for 10 years. It’s bubbling and it’s on the verge of going to the next level.
“I used to travel around the UK running the British Padel Tour and although I tried to do as much as possible, it was tough and now I have to be honest and say that the LTA have really opened my mind.
“We have now developed a strategic plan for the sport to grow and it all makes sense and I can say that the LTA is willing to invest a lot of money into padel but timing is vital to that.
“I’ve seen this development happen all around Europe in countries like France, Belgium, The Netherlands, and Italy, where padel had reached a stage where it then just snowballed and really took off and that is where I feel we are at in the UK.
“Maybe this year growth has been somewhat slow at the beginning of the year but now it is about to explode. For example just three weeks ago we were at 160 courts and this week we are now at 179 putting us in a better position to reach our end of year goal of 250 total courts, and by 2023 we hope to get to 400 courts.
“Every day venues contact me to say they are building courts. However, so many then experience delays mainly due to the vast backlog of planning applications which can set projects back several months or even more if councils fire back with questions or concerns.”
Yet Murray’s determination to make sure that within the UK all aspects of the sport are sound and his attention to detail are impressively comprehensive.
Murray said: “The most interesting part of my role is trying to develop everything in tandem, as infrastructure grows all the other areas from competition to education and workforce needs to develop accordingly and this can often be a bit of a challenge.
“We have all of these performance players who have grown up playing in Spain, so in essence and on a global scale we appear to be ahead of the game, with performance players competing internationally and GB teams represented in a variety of categories from juniors to seniors at World Championship events, and yet back home there is zero grassroots and very limited infrastructure.
“So, the LTA has integrated padel following examples of other tennis nations primarily France and Italy and today we have taken a stance to integrate and facilitate play at all levels from grassroots to performance and all of this will grow but we can’t run before we walk.
“If we’re to assure long term sustainable growth all parts of the game need to develop simultaneously, starting with infrastructure. Interestingly however we’re in a situation where we find ourselves developing certain parts of the game top down.
“For example, although the game is yet to develop in the UK, we have performance players that took up the game years ago over in Spain. Based on necessity these players base themselves in Spain to fulfil their training and competition needs. Many even compete around Europe professionally.
“Our plans therefore include an enhanced competition structure, to accommodate that top end of the player pathway and assure British players can compete in the UK. This will enable us to showcase higher levels of play, increase awareness, to motivate new players into the game including the next generation.”
While there are around 1,000 padel courts in France and Belgium the fuse has been slower to light in the UK with the first court in Wales just opened by Annabel Croft a fortnight ago.
Yet Murray is sanguine about the metrics of growth in Great Britain: “We have just started measuring (growth) and that is parallel with the development of infrastructure. So, we are at 160 courts and there are less than 89,000 people annually participating, with 15,000 monthly and you might think that is a lot but realistically that is someone having played padel once per annum or month.
“More often people have been abroad and played in Spain and for this reason it’s achieving greater awareness,” then with a laugh the LTA’s Head of Padel added: “Thankfully so if it’s to get away from people asking: ‘Is it played on water?’”
All of which leads one to believe that this might very well, in a padel context, be another Murray who is the right man at the right time to lead his sport onto centre stage in the UK.
PART TWO TOMORROW
