Ignite Padel to expand Speke site into UK's largest venue

Ignite Padel will turn its Speke site into the UK’s largest single padel venue, taking it from 10 courts to 17 and from 27,500 square feet to 56,000 square feet by August 2026. The build is a useful barometer for the sport’s commercial phase in the North West: operators are no longer just adding courts, they are betting that a flagship of this size can stay full.

The redesign is built around more than match slots. Ignite is framing the site as a 24-hour community sports hub with a viewing gallery, a healthy eating restaurant, a wellness centre and 100 extra parking spaces. The wellness area is set to include a 20-capacity sauna, a 20-capacity steam room and a six-capacity ice bath, while the company says the upgraded venue could eventually host international tournaments in partnership with the International Padel Federation.

Tom Buck, Ignite’s general manager, said the expansion will add 15 jobs and lift total staff to 60. He also said the build is being delivered by local Liverpool contractors, which ties the project to the regional economy as tightly as it does to the sport itself. Buck expects Ignite to reach 30 courts across Liverpool and Cheshire within just over a year, a pace that would have sounded aggressive even 18 months ago.

Speke is only the latest step in a rapid rollout. Ignite opened its first Liverpool site at Queens Drive in West Derby in April 2025 with six floodlit outdoor courts, then added Cheshire Oaks in Ellesmere Port in September 2025 with five indoor and two outdoor courts, before launching Speke in December 2025 as its biggest venue to date. The company says the site has already drawn high-profile attention, including a visit from Paris Saint-Germain president Nasser Al-Khelaifi before his club’s recent Champions League match in Liverpool.

The broader market makes the gamble easier to understand. The Lawn Tennis Association said in March 2026 that 860,000 adults and juniors had played padel at least once in the previous 12 months, up from just over 400,000 at the end of 2024, 129,000 at the end of 2023 and 15,000 in 2019. Liverpool’s pipeline is filling too, with Padel FC proposing a Wavertree Sports Park development backed by Jürgen Klopp and Marc Klopp. Speke is now the clearest test of how far the boom can stretch before supply starts chasing the player base.