Manchester lands Sci-Mx Padel Series with global stars in town

Manchester’s turn as a padel stop got a serious upgrade with the Sci-Mx Padel Series at Manchester Padel Club in Heald Green, a free two-day showcase scheduled for August 10 and 11 that was billed around 20 world-class stars. Promotional posts said the field included the men’s and women’s world number ones, while Padel Tonic named Arturo Coello, Agustín Tapia and Federico Chingotto among the headline attractions.

The format was built to do more than fill a calendar slot. Sci-Mx said two players would win the chance to play against the world’s best at the Manchester event, a detail that turned the series into a participation hook as well as an elite exhibition. For a sport that sells speed, touch and angles as much as trophies, giving local players a pathway onto the same court as the top names was a smart way to make the spectacle feel closer to the grassroots game.

That matters in Manchester because the UK padel market has been moving fast enough to reward cities that can convert interest into repeat visits. The Lawn Tennis Association said in an April 2024 presentation that Britain had around 400 padel courts at the time, up 600 percent from 2019, and that competition delivery had risen 500 percent. By July 2025, a UK court summary put the country at 1,004 courts across 325 venues, while participation more than doubled in 2025.

Manchester fits that growth pattern better than most places. The city already has the kind of dense, urban sports audience that can turn a well-marketed exhibition into a genuine crowd event, and padel’s compact, social format plays well in that setting. A later 2026 industry summary mapped more than 1,800 venues in the UK and more than 400,000 regular players, which shows how much room there is for events outside London to matter in the national picture.

The naming of Sci-Mx on the series also signaled sponsor confidence in padel’s trajectory. This was not a one-off celebrity appearance dressed up as a tournament. It was a branded, free, star-led event in a major northern city, and that combination made Manchester look less like a stop on the way to somewhere else and more like a place padel now has to serve.