Padel Pro

Padel Pro calls itself the first stand-alone padel club in the Middle East. Its outdoor courts at One Central sit in the middle of Dubai: blue courts in glass boxes, an entrance built from a shipping container and a shop with a wall of rackets. On every side are the towers of Sheikh Zayed Road, with the Museum of the Future across the road.

Padel courts are built to a standard, the same blue carpet, glass walls and net in every club in the city, so on a phone screen one club’s highlight clip is hard to tell from another’s.

What this club has that no other can copy is where it stands. So the camera stays low and wide and the towers are always in shot: the Museum of the Future over a serve, Emirates Towers behind the glass, the sun going down between the buildings while a rally goes on.

The players are filmed mid-point rather than posed. The club’s name is on the net, the sign and the glass, so it is read without being announced.

It opens on the club’s name, on a container and on the net, then a serve with the skyline behind it, the feet, the ball, and the logo on the glass with the Museum of the Future reflected in it. The middle is play: a backhand with the museum behind it, a smash under Emirates Towers, a doubles rally shot from the far end as the sky turns orange.

It closes on the sign against the towers, a player at the net post with the museum over his shoulder, the court between the towers at sunset, and a ball and racket left on the carpet as the light goes.