Differences between men´s and women´s professional padel depending on the performance according to the set, the round and the type of tournament

Abstract

The objective of this research was to analyse the differences between sex in professional players, who competed in the World Padel Tour (WPT) during four seasons (2016-2019). Performance indicators (winners´s break points, errors, winners and winner’s smashes...) were collected from 1070 sets (532 matches), from the open access videos of the WPT YouTube channel. Differences between men and women in performance indicators according to set number, round and tournament type were analysed through descriptive and inferential analysis. Men make more smashes and smashes winners than women regardless of the game context. In contrast, women make more break points, break point winners, errors, and winners than men. There are more significant differences between women and men (p<.05) in the performance indicators in the open tournament, followed by the master tournaments and where there are fewer differences in the final master tournaments. Furthermore, smashes and smashes winners are the performance indicators where the magnitude of the effect size is largest (d>.80). These were of great interest, as it helps coaches to know which performance indicators condition the style of play according to the sex of the athletes.