To create a tournament board is never an easy thing. Place the heads of series, insert qualified then the rest of the teams can convert to brain teaser. But what about WPT tables ?

This is a subject that had already been discussed. Why the WPT does enter the seeds this late during the week while during ATP tennis tournaments, everyone comes in at the same time?

During tournaments of World Padel Tour, there is 3 tables in 1: preprevia, previa and finally the final table. According to the classification of the two players who compose it, a pair enters more or less far in the table. So much so that for preprevia players it can turn into a real way of the cross, especially among men !

Preprevia table

32 matches scheduled for the first round with exempt pairs for their classification. Logical or not it is like that. Only the best 8 pairs will be able to access the previa table. So far everything seems more or less normal.

Table of previa

16 matches scheduled at the start of the table including the 8 pairs that came out of preprevia. In this table phase, pairs are also exempt from the first round. Normal? -be, up to you to tell us! The qualified plus if necessary the “lucky losers”as is the case in Alicante) play their first round of previa. In case of victory, they face a seed for a place in the final of previa!

In the end, after these three rounds of previa, only 4 pairs will have the chance to reach the last table.

Final table

This is where it gets harder. It should be borne in mind that the 4 pairs that come out of previa played at best two matches on Tuesday, at worst 6 games played between Sunday morning and Tuesday afternoon ! Some therefore arrive exhausted in the main draw, we will come back to that.

In tournaments Open, the first 4 seeds of the tournament are first round free. So there are 12 matches in the sixteenth, or 24 pairs, but only 4 of them came from the qualifications. So we play 16 pairs of final table between them, then 4 pairs against the qualifiers.

Hard to go tickle the cracks, isn't it? Why not always use the Masters format and thus give more chances to qualifying players?

The sequence of matches

This is obviously a factor that must be taken into account. In preprevia and previa, the teams play 2 matches per day. Only the final table players have one. Why ? Why can't they too play two games on the day they enter the tournament?

This would sometimes lead to runbalanced encounters but a format with a start of the tournament in 32nd or even 64th finals for everyone, as in tennis tournaments, could allow qualifying teams to have more visibility ...

The question should perhaps be asked of the players themselves. If the preprevia and previa players are able to keep up with this breakneck pace of 2 games per day, the final table players can certainly do it too. So why protect them? So that they are in top form on Fridays during televised and generally suspenseful matches?

A further boost for previa players?

You have to be aware that a top level player earns enough money with his appearances in WPT tournaments. For a maximum of 4/5 matches every 2 weeks, the earnings and sponsors are more than enough to provide them with a comfortable life. Besides thatfrom the round of XNUMX, the hotel is taken care of by the World Padel Tour.

Of course the stars of padel world have worked hard to get to where they are, but for those starting out in qualifying, it's still a lot more complicated. Not only do they have to pay for the hotel upon arrival, but also travel, coaches etc. for most of the time not receiving any prize money… The WPT generally does not allow them to live, they must have a side job and are therefore forced to free themselves to come and play the World Padel Tour.

They chose him for sure, and qualifying players benefit from bonus points for wins to get to the places that allow you to enter the final table more quickly. Nevertheless, wouldn't it be easier to change this system a little to allow more players to navigate? Do you think this could help to raise the level even more on the World Padel Tour ?

Julien Bondia

Julien Bondia is a teacher of padel in Tenerife (Spain). Columnist and advisor, he helps you play better through his tutorials and tactical/technical articles padel.