World’s top padel players set for Nad Al Sheba tournament

Sport360 staff 14:39 12/07/2014
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  • Gaining in popularity: Padel tennis stars will be in Dubai for a tournament.

    Some of the world’s top padel players, including Argentine greats Hernan ‘Bebe’ Auguste and Mariano Lasaigues, will be seen in action this week at the Nad Al Sheba Sports Arena.

    Organisers of the Nad Al Sheba (NAS) Ramadan Sports Festival have assembled a star-studded field for the padel tournament, which starts n Sunday, with Auguste, a two-time world champion and winner of over 100 professional tournaments, and his former doubles partner and current Argentine No 1 Lasaigues headlining the act.

    Richard Brooks, UK No1, Portuguese No1 Vasco Pascoal, US No1 John Chun and his American teammate Ricardo Alcantara, former world junior champions Andoni Bardasco and Gonzalo Perez Rubio, and rising stars Franco Stupaczuk and Martin Di Nenno are also part of the field.

    UAE No1 Omar Behroozian is excited about the event after his first competitive experience of padel at NAS 2014 this year.

    “This is really a lot of fun,” said Behroozian, who will play in the final of the UAE Nationals category of the padel tournament alongside Abdulrahman Al Janahi following their win over Hasan and Eisa Sharif on the weekend.

    For the title, they will meet Mohammed and Fares Al Janahi, who won 6-5, 6-5 over Sheikh Saeed Al Maktoum and Omar Sharif.

    “We were not here for the tournament last year because we were preparing for the Davis Cup,” added Behroozian. “But a few colleagues from the tennis scene played it and they said it’s fun. So this year we decided we will try it out. It’s Ramadan and the atmosphere is really good. So it’s fun. It’s a nice game.

    “I just hope more locals will be encouraged to play padel and hopefully it can shoot up the popularity of racquet sports.”

    In the teams’ competition, Hala Madrid defeated Al Mansoori 2-0 to set up a date with home team NAS in the final. On the squash courts, Mubarak Mohsin beat Sandeep Ramachandran to reach the final, where he meets Aamir Khan.

    In volleyball, Al Forsan and Al Matoog confirmed their status as two of the favourites with easy wins on their way to the last eight.

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