“Is she good or not”? “I have the right to do that or not”? We can play padel every week, sometimes for years, it happens that we ignore or forget certain subtle, complex and sometimes controversial rules.

Padel Magazine has already detailed in the past some points of settlement, but it is good to do a reminder shot or to deepen certain questions that come up regularly on the mat. Even who invite themselves to the table where the players drink a beer after their game, replay the match and disagree among themselves...

The controversy will reach its height in cases where the international regulations, established by the FIP, says the opposite of Franco-French regulations, governed by the FFT !

Here are some of the questions that come up regularly and can cause amusement or bewilderment. And even turn to bun creping, or even boxing in extreme cases.

To touch is sometimes to sink

■ Let or not let? When serving, if the ball hits the net (or the post), it is sometimes replayed, sometimes faulty. Indeed, if it touches the fence, either directly or after a single rebound, it is faulty. On the other hand, if it hits the fence after two rebounds, it is good.
It gets more complicated when a ball hits the net and leaves the field through the door: if outings are allowed, the ball is let, so it has to be played again; if outings are prohibited, that ball is a foul!

■ Slice of cake! Above the walls, whether glazed, screened or walled, there is a slice, more or less wide. If the ball bounces into the opponent's court, and hits the horizontal bracket, then the point continues, whether the ball comes back on the court or goes outwards. But if, by some miracle, the ball comes to rest on this slice, the point will be a winner.

■ The ball not to be touched.- If you or your partner make a smash which returns to your side after having touched the ground then the glass, without the ball being touched by your adversaries, above all do not touch it! Indeed, in this case, the point is acquired only if the ball touches the ground or fails in the net. If you take the volley ball with the racket, hand, or any other part of the body, you lose the point.

Net padel mestre club
Beware of the net

■ Crossing prohibited.- If you're at the net and your opponents are hitting a slow, high ball (a missed lob, for example), it can be tempting to go “pick” that ball on the other side of the net. Well this temptation will be the last because you will lose the point! On the contrary, you must wait for the ball to cross the net – at the risk of it hitting the boards – before playing it.

Sneak into the net

■ Authorized crossing.- If a smash from your opponents bounces into your court, hits one or two panes and returns to their court, in this case you are authorized to cross the net (without touching it) with your arm and racket to hit the ball.

■ Never touch the net.- Under no circumstances are you allowed to touch the net during a point, whether with the racket, arm, legs or any part of your body (including clothing). It's infuriating when, carried away by your momentum, you brush the net after having brilliantly defended a spike; but it is so! Special case, if you touch the net after having completed the exchange (for example if the ball touches the opponents or goes out by 4), the point will be for you. You can therefore play the tightrope walkers for a while and then crash into the net once the point is over!

■ Hello poles! Touching the net, we told you, it's “niet”! Touching the post is also forbidden according to the rules of the French Tennis Federation. But as nothing is simple, the International Federation of padel allows a player to touch the upper part of the post, provided that outs are allowed. In this case, a player also has the right to touch the mesh frame of the door, but only in his half of the field...

chiostri post mar del plata
Some poles are taller than others

■ Play in the opponent's net.- Is it true that you can win a point by hitting a ball directly into the net? The answer is yes, provided it's the net on your opponents' side. This is possible in two cases. When a smash from your opponents returns to their court, you have the right to pass your racquet to the other side and send the ball into their net.
The other case is when you leave the field to recover a "par 3": it is then allowed to sneak your ball through the door on the opponent's side, either by bouncing it on the ground, or by aiming for the net.

Be careful, if the ball hits the net and then bounces on the ground, your opponents still have the right to send it home!

O fence, o despair

■ Smile, you're toast! If you are playing on an old field with a damaged or deformed fence, prepare your tissues. Thus, a ball that bounces on the ground and leaves the field through a hole in the fence will be lost for you if it happens on your side. Ditto if the ball gets stuck in too large a mesh of the grid... This sport is crazy, we tell you!

Do you have questions, criticisms, objections to make or anecdotes to tell? So feel free to comment on this article!

After 40 years of tennis, Jérôme falls into the pot of padel in 2018. Since then, he thinks about it every morning while shaving… but never shaves pala in hand! Journalist in Alsace, he has no other ambition than to share his passion with you, whether you speak French, Italian, Spanish or English.

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