Interview with Samuel Devrand (Ambassador Black Crown, Padel International and online sales site www.padel-shopping.fr) to better understand the specifics of left-handed players and why they can have awkward play for their opponents.

What makes the particularity of a southpaw?

Samuel Devrand: We are a minority of players so having a left-hander in front of us can disrupt the playing habits or patterns practiced most of the time. As you say Clément: “Because for the adversaries, the blows and the effects are reversed…” vis-a-vis a left-hander.

A southpaw, it's not so nice to play?

No, it's not nice ... This can be an asset, provided you team up with a right-hander. 

The advantage is to have the 2 forehands in the center: the left-hander is always right on the court. Indeed, the game during an exchange almost systematically passes through the center of the field so on the forehands of the left-handed / right-handed pair, the forehand being for almost all players the strongest side.

Otherwise, we can perhaps speak of a psychological aspect, due to the fact that we are less numerous but it can disappear quickly at the beginning of the match if the opponent realizes from the first snowshoes that the southpaw in his Diagonal does not put him in such difficulty.

A lefty is it so boring to play?

I read articles that reported on scientific studies and showed that left-handed people also had an advantage in dueling sports by processing information that arrives directly in the right hemisphere of the brain ... personally, I have trouble to see the effects and I believe more at a glance and good reading of the game and trajectories!

How is it happening at the smash?

This can be a disadvantage on lobs because there are potentially two to be able to smasher. But personally, I do not think that's the case. For example, in the pair I trained with Simon Boissé, it was heard before the game that the game over the shoulder that came exactly in the middle, it was Simon who took because he was more explosive than me. On the other hand, in the Lapouge / Weber pair, it seems to me that it's the southpaw, Matt Lapouge taking the high balls in the center.

Have you ever noticed that your opponents change their style of play when they face a southpaw?

From there to saying that an opponent changes his style of play because a left-hander is in front, I don't think so… in any case, not systematically. On the other hand, it often happened to me to hear after a point lost by my opponent “but put… yes, think about it, he is left-handed !!! ". Which means implicitly that this player will change his zones against a left-hander.

Left-handed people are a rare commodity ... Are you asking more than some other players for this?

Personally, I don't feel like I'm more “in demand” or “wanted” as a partner because I'm left-handed. For example, no one came to see me saying “I'm looking for a left-hander! ". On the other hand after the matches, it happened to me sometimes to have heard from my adversaries that my game of left-hander bothered them, and my partner congratulated himself on teaming up with a left-hander.

At high level, the world number 1, the player of reference: Fernando Belasteguin has been playing for several years with left-handers, from Pablo Lima to Juan Martin Diaz. It is, I think, a deliberate choice on his part to have wanted to team up with left-handed people. Afterwards, more generally, we should ask right-handed people, if they are “looking for” to play with them… In any case, personally, I am not looking for left-handed people!

Learn more about left-handed people?
https://padelmagazine.fr/le-joueur-gaucher-une-denree-rare-au-padel/

Franck Binisti

Franck Binisti discovers the padel at the Club des Pyramides in 2009 in the Paris region. Since padel is part of his life. You often see him touring France going to cover the major events of padel French.

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