Ben Nichols, CEO and founder of communications consultancy Padel 22, continues his series assessing the truth behind the ‘padel boom’ in its key growth nations around the world
With 1.4 billion inhabitants and rising, India is expected to overtake China as the world’s most populous nation later this year.
It’s estimated that 23% of Indians play a sport, so that provides a market of around 322 million people for the world’s fastest growing sport to turbo-boost its attempt at global domination.
Getting as many Indians acquainted with our game will require a clear long-term vision and strategy. Whilst nothing will challenge cricket’s hegemony any time soon, padel can achieve success by targeting the country’s growing middle-class population which is now breaking the cliché of India’s rich-poor divide.
Padel can work as a good local community sport, a sport for school kids, and perhaps above all in India it can work for the corporate sector.
With off-peak court hours to fill throughout the day, and India’s fast-growing business economy sector, there are businesses aplenty who could fall for padel’s charms.
One only has to look to the success of the Indian Premier League (IPL) which has a value of $11 billion (yes, you read that right) to look at the potential that India has if it plays its cards right.
Plans are afoot. The Indian Padel Federation is in place and has so far organised seven national ranking events. They have been part of discussions to set up an Asian Padel Cup, Asian Junior World Cup qualifiers and regional coaching programmes.
Padel India is opening its first facility in the Silicon Valley-esque tech hub of Bangalore this year, with a bigger club and brand rollout for the padel market expected later.
Watch this space for more developments…
Pics: Indian Padel Federation
