How to assess a padel player: a six-pillar method

Most padel “assessments” are a coach’s gut feeling after a few rallies. Useful in the moment, useless three months later. You cannot remember the number you never wrote down, and you certainly cannot show a player they have improved.

A real assessment is repeatable. Score the player on a small set of pillars, with a written guide at each level, so the same performance gets the same number whoever is holding the clipboard. Here is a six-pillar method built for padel, with anchored levels you can coach from.

The six pillars

Padel is a doubles game played off the glass. A useful framework has to cover the strokes, but also the things that actually decide points: where the pair stands, who takes what, and when to lob.

1. Technical. The strokes themselves, including the padel-specific ones: wall play (reading the rebound off the back and side glass and recovering it cleanly), the bandeja as a controlled holding shot, the vibora when there is more pace to take, plus volley, lob and the basic groundstrokes.
2. Court positioning and movement as a pair. Net dominance, the staggered positions, covering the middle, and moving as a unit rather than two singles players sharing a box.
3. Tactical and decision-making. Shot selection under pressure: when to lob and reset, when to attack the gap, when to play the glass deliberately, when to take the ball early.
4. Physical. Footwork, the split step, recovery speed, balance in the corners, and the stamina to hold quality across a long match.
5. Mental. Composure after errors, focus between points, communication with a partner, and resilience when a set slips.
6. Match application. The real test: does any of the above survive a competitive match against opponents who are trying to break it?

Anchor every level with a written guide

A score is only as good as the words behind it. Rate each pillar 0 to 10, and write a description at each level (or at least at the key bands) so the number is anchored to observable behaviour. Senior-anchored is the honest way to do it: a 10 is what a strong competitive player looks like, and a junior or improver sits where they genuinely sit, with room above them to grow into.

For court positioning, that ladder might read:

• Level 3: holds the net when handed it but drifts out of position and leaves the middle open.
• Level 6: moves up and back with the partner most of the time, covers the middle, but is slow to recover after being lobbed.
• Level 9: the pair moves as one unit, the middle is rarely exposed, and lobs are anticipated and reset without losing the net for long.

Now “a 6 on positioning” is not a hunch. It is a paragraph two coaches can both point at. That is the whole game: any two coaches reach the same score, and the score still means the same thing to you next season.

Compare the player’s view against yours

Once you have scored a player, have them score themselves on the same six pillars. Then put the two side by side.

The gap is where the coaching is. A player who rates their bandeja a 9 when you have it at a 5 is over-attacking a holding shot and losing the net. A player who rates their positioning a 4 when you see a 7 has lost confidence and is hanging back when they have earned the right to press. The number tells you what to work on; the gap tells you what to talk about.

This perception gap is the single most useful conversation in an assessment, and most coaches never have it because they never capture both views.

From weakest pillar to a goal

An assessment that ends in a radar chart is half a job. The point is to act on it.

Take the lowest pillar (or the lowest skill within a pillar) and turn it into a development goal. If wall play is the weak link, the goal is concrete: “recover three out of four balls off the back glass into a controlled lob by the end of the block.” Then your next sessions are planned from that goal, not from a drill you happened to fancy. Assess, set the goal, plan the work, deliver, reassess. That loop is what turns a score into progress.

When you reassess at the end of the block, put then-and-now on one radar and look at the per-pillar trend. A player can see their wall play move from a 4 to a 6 in their own colours. That is far more motivating than “you’re getting better, trust me.”

Make the framework yours

Built badminton-first, the framework is editable end to end. The pillars, the level descriptors and the drill library all bend to how you coach. Tune the bands for a beginner group or a competitive pair, drop in your own padel terminology, and adapt the same structure for tennis or another racket sport. You are configuring a proven structure, not commissioning a custom build, and the assessment stays consistent because the anchors travel with it.