UP437 Pickle, Padel and the LTA: Natural Home or NGB Landgrab?

There’s a row going on over who should run the nascent and potentially commercially valuable sports of padel and pickleball. This issue has a universal application across many sports, as NGBs seek to wrap their arms around what they might call strategic adjacencies. So, what are pros and cons of the LTA owning Padel and Pickleball.Is the NGB model the right one? Do we want or need every version of a sport to have its own governing body, or is the LTA just the best compromise solution when it comes to allocating money. Does the attribution incentive outlined above crowd out privately run Padel or Pickleball businesses or is the LTA helping to build a market for them?Our guests are Karen Mitchell and Alex Inglot.Karen is chair of Pickleball England, a former American Express executive who sits on the World Pickleball Federation’s Board of Directors. Alex is a former Board member of the ATP Tennis Tour, an investor in padel projects in the UK and beyond, and founder of the All The Angles podcast covering the business of padel.Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.