The Italian national teams, male and female, are doing well in the matches of the sixteenth edition of World Padel Championships, in progress in Dubai. The world titles, in the event organized by the International Padel Federation chaired by Luigi Carraro with the collaboration of Uaepa, the Padel Federation of the United Arab Emirates, will be awarded (together with a prize pool of 500 thousand dollars) next Saturday.
He boom
In any case, 2022 will be remembered, as far as Italy is concerned, as the year of the consecration of fell as a sport and as a socio-economic phenomenon. By the end of the year, in fact, it is estimated that one million people will practice it with some regularity in the over 6 thousand fields built throughout the national territory (there were a thousand in 2019, 3,300 in 2021).
To get an idea of the growth trend, just think that in 2019, before the outbreak of the pandemic , there were just 200 thousand players in the Peninsula. Obviously this boom has translated into an increase in turnover: in 2022 880 thousand rackets will be sold, compared to 180 thousand in 2019, 310 thousand in 2020 and 700 thousand last year.
The turnover
These are some of the numbers lined up in the report of the Italian Sport System Observatory of Bank Ifis dedicated to the padel phenomenon and which will translate into a total turnover, in the course of 2022, of 693 million euros. According to the Observatory, 2022 will ultimately see double-digit growth in revenues over 2021, with an increase of 25 percent. In detail, direct revenues, that is to say the revenues from the rental of the fields, will weigh 425 million, 61 percent. The other 39% will be linked to the related industries, divided between the sale of new rackets, which are worth 165 million, and the construction of new fields which will have an economic value of 103 million (even if with the increase in the prices of raw materials there may be a slowdown).
The agonist effect
The growth of the padel has been constant over the years. The turnover in 2019 was just 87 million and in 2020 it reached 176 million. The leap was recorded in 2021, when the padel sector collected 554 million. From 2019 to 2022, there was an 800 percent increase. In fact, it is if until the outbreak of the pandemic the padel was confinable to a niche phenomenon, albeit driven by famous testimonials and former footballers, it is with the restrictions due to Covid also for team or contact sports activities that the padel, given its characteristics, has caught on.