former tennis player, Adrian Dandois (53rd France) has become a real fan of padel. With 42 tournaments played in 2022, Adrien lived a year at 100 per hour. Father since last December, the Captain of Douai has lowered his ambitions but keeps in mind his main objectives: the top 50 and the maintenance of his team in National 1.

Tennis as a school

In tennis I was 2/6 for a few years. JI was a “matcheur”, I played a lot of tournaments, between 50 and 60 matches per year. But after the covid I reduced the competitions. At one point in tennis, I felt that I was leveling off. I rarely had a powerful game, I always had a tactical, intelligent game. I am known for my forehand “chops” and slightly atypical shots. I realized that my style suited the padel. 

At first, I mainly saw the padel as an opportunity to improve myself in tennis. It gave me more ball touch, point management, tactics. It reversed over time.

I remember that a friend who played tennis with me advised me padel : he told me " you'll see, I'll make you play padel with a pot grip, it's horrible to see play! ". At padel you may have been good at tennis, if you play with guys who play good tennis padel, it is useless to know how to play tennis. I started playing in 2016 at Padel Attitude, one of the great clubs of the North which has since disappeared. I got into the game slowly and became a big fan of padel.

The French university championships, as a first memory

In tennis I have always loved the atmosphere of interclubs, of playing as a team. We drink shots together, we all know each other and the padel that's great for that. This side team atmosphere that you find every weekend in tournaments, it's satisfying.

If I have to think back to a match it was with a friend with whom I started the padel and we had done college championships padel in 2018. . We qualified for France. It was not the first objective, but France was played in Lille, where I was studying. So it was good for us. We found ourselves in the semi-finals leading against (Dorian) De Meyer and (Thomas) Vanbauce who were also starting the padel at the time. We lost in three straight sets but it was one of the first tournaments that made me want to play padel.

Le padel in the north

When I started, it was Padel Attitude with 10 indoor courts and an outdoor court. So there was a big club in the area. Three big clubs vampirized a bit of everything and there was immediately a good level in the north.

Padel Attitude then stopped and since then we have had a lot of tennis clubs that have invested in two or three courts, private clubs that have released a few tracks. The offer is a little more distributed. It's less centered on big cities, as it was at the beginning of the development of the padel. It's an evil for a good. A good in the sense that we have less road to go to play. An evil in the sense that before the best players met at Padel Attitude. Today we all find ourselves scattered in different clubs. Overall the private and the public we are about 50/50 and it coexists rather well.

46 tournaments in 2022, a year at 100 per hour

I am a volunteer and Vice-President in my club in Douai where we set up two fields of padel indoor to develop our structure. Since then, I have succeeded in motivating my whole family a little to get down to padel : my brother, my father. It's a family affair. This year, it's true that I did a lot of tournaments, but above all I did a lot of P250s with my brother, who has become a fan of padel. So it greatly inflated my number of tournaments.

I had to 25 competitive tournaments between the P2000 P1000 P500 and about fifteen “fun” tournaments with my brother. In a year of padel he's progressing well and now it's getting more serious on the courts, he's starting to catch me on the diagonals, it's more fun but competitive. As soon as I do a tournament with him, it's to go all the way.

“Le Capitaine” is focused on the city of Douai

I'm super happy to have my two fields of padel in my tennis club in which I have always played, but in terms of services, things that we can offer people, it is still desirable that it stays next to private clubs with lots of courts that can offer a bar nice, a real place to live.

With friends from padel, we had plans to set up a team with Hauts-de-France and we managed to keep the team in National 1. We represented Douai and we finished 9rd.

This year the objective is still to participate in a maximum of P1000 and P2000. I would like to re-enter the top 50, that would be good. My ambitions are not to go international, but to maintain my Douai club in N1 and if possible to compete in the French championships. But for a few months there is a new parameter that comes into play. I have been a dad since December 2022, so obviously things have changed a bit. I train a little less but I still do a lot of tournaments.

Le padel as life balance

I need to play sports on the side to be more efficient at work and vice versa. Even during my first year of medicine, I did not stop the sport. I never saw that as a constraint. We make time for the things we enjoy. THE padel it's something that makes me feel good so I organize myself for it.

Complete and versatile player

A year ago I would have described myself as an aggressive player who has a good smash, obviously before I was basing myself more on my qualities as a tennis player. As in the North in winter the game is slower and different, I would describe myself as a complete forward player. I love the volley, but I try more and more to "play padel », know how to build my point from the bottom to be able to bring it well.

In official tournaments, I played 80 or 90% of the time on the left. On the small tournaments my brother plays most of the time on the left so with him I play on the right. In the end, by dint of doing small tournaments on the right, I realized that I loved playing on this side. Behind, I also tried the experience in other tournaments and we got a third place in P1000 with Manuel Vives in particular. I even won a P500 with Lilian Fourré in the North.

I find myself freer on the left, I like this slightly more creative side, but when I play on the right, my rowing side from the baseline in tennis comes back and it doesn't work too badly (laughs).

Management of important points to work on

The volley is one of my strengths, but when you reach a certain level the players in front are more precise and more aggressive and I find it difficult to be precise with my volley. This is something I need to work on. The management of important points too. I lost a lot of matches this year 7/6 in the third with Éric Quillet where on the important moments, break points, set points where we did not convert. I think that's what I miss playing against guys in the top 20 or top 30.

The partner dance

This year it's true that I didn't have a regular partner for my tournaments. I had to adapt to availability. At home there is not really a player with whom I have established a project. I will probably do the regional championships with Alex Boilevin. the objective is to go to the French championships together. Plus he's a dentist like me. We go there more as colleagues than as partners!

It's both a disadvantage of not having a fixed partner, in terms of benchmarks when you come up against the top 20 or top 30, you inevitably lose because they play together and work on game patterns. But that allows me to play both on the right and on the left, to evolve with different player profiles and that's a lot of progress.

In the future, I would like to have a regular teammate, but you have to admit that this year it brought me a lot to play with different partners!

Vincent Gallie

A fan of oval football, round ball but also racket sports, he was stung by the padel during his adolescence in Galicia. As comfortable in front of the camera as behind a microphone, Vince will be able to bring his vision and expertise as a fan of the little yellow ball.

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