Dubai: The vice president of the Emirates Padel Tennis Association (EPTA) has promised a high-calibre international competition when the World Padel Tour (WPT) makes its stop in Dubai at the end of October.
The EPTA has committed itself to hosting the Dubai Padel Masters at the Nad Al Sheba indoor sports complex from October 26-31. The hosting of the high-profile event was announced by Shaikh Saeed Bin Juma Al Maktoum, President, EPTA during the course of the Nad Al Sheba (NAS) Ramadan Sports Tournament that concluded earlier this month.
The Higher Organising Committee for the tournament met this week with Khalifa Al Khoury, Vice President, EPTA as the chairman and Mohammad Al Mutwaiwee as vice president and tournament director.
The WPT calendar consists of 19 tournaments this year, along with five Masters Open and four Challengers. As per the heirarchy of events, the Masters are the most important competitions on the professional world of Padel Tennis. In 2015, the five stops on the Masters Tour will be held in Dubai, Barcelona, Monaco, Malaga and Valencia.
The Dubai Padel Masters will consist of two qualifiers, one in Spain and the other in Dubai. At the end of these two qualifiers, the best four pairs at each venue will advance to the main draw of the Dubai Padel Masters where they will be drawn with 28 ranked pairs.
The Masters tournaments also have the highest WPT Ranking Points with the men’s winner of each competition getting 1,500 points and the women’s winners bagging 1,000 points.
“The first step has been taken with the formation of the higher organising committee. The challenge now is to work efficiently with the deadline in mind so that we can stage a high standard of competition in October. Given our track record of organising top sporting events, we are confident that once again Dubai will come up with something different at the Dubai Padel Masters,” Al Mutaiwee told Gulf News.
“One of the biggest challenges before us is that we have very little time at our disposal. But with an experienced team led by Shaikh Saeed we feel we can deliver one of the best tournaments on the Tour,” he added.
Each Masters circuit tournament consists of the best 104 players in the world of Padel Tennis – 28 pairs in the men’s competition and 24 in the women’s event.
Dubai hosted some of the best padel tennis players during the NAS Sports Tournament with reigning World Champion Sanyo Gutierrez teaming up with Juani Mieres to stage a late rally defeating Juan Martin Diaz and Maxi Sanchez 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the final.
“We have the experience of dealing with some of the top players in the world. All of them love being in Dubai and we will be there putting up one of the best competitions in October,” Al Mutaiwee promised.
Competitors accumulate points at each of the Masters tournaments with the aim of qualifying to the season-ending Masters Final to be held in Madrid, Spain, in December.
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