USPA names team for 2026 World University Padel Championship in Malaga

The United States Padel Association named Leonardo Flores, Sergio Talero, Delfina Inza and Emma Avina for the 2026 FISU World University Padel Championship in Malaga, Spain, putting a new American university pathway on the sport’s first FISU stage. Manuel Avina, a USPA Board Member, will serve as team delegate.

The championship runs July 7-11 at PSM Fantasy in Malaga, with the broader event window set for July 4-12. FISU says the tournament is the very first padel competition in its program and will gather student-athletes from more than 20 countries. Play will be staged in men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles, with no further matches played in mixed after elimination. The University of Malaga is organizing the event.

PSM Fantasy gives the championship a polished international setting: FISU describes the venue as an exclusive club with 12 indoor courts split across two adjacent buildings. The site also includes a central court with seating for 100 spectators, plus warm-up space, a café, shop, changing rooms and offices. For a sport built around doubles chemistry and tight court geometry, the venue looks tailored for the kind of fast, close-quarters padel that university competition can showcase well.

The American roster reflects a blend of current and emerging talent. Delfina Inza arrives with a résumé that already includes the 2025 FIP Junior World Cup qualifying phase in Costa Daurada, Spain, as well as appearances for the United States at the 2025 and 2026 America Padel Cup. She has also built experience in Spain, Chile and Brazil. Emma Avina has become a fixture on the USPA junior circuit and one of the country’s top female juniors, while Flores and Talero round out a team that gives the United States depth in both men’s and women’s brackets.

The broader story is what this roster says about the American pipeline. USPA’s 2026 collegiate calendar already linked Regional Collegiate Padel Festivals in the spring, the USPA Collegiate National Championships in May and the Malaga FISU event in July. Its eligibility rule requires athletes, except for recent graduates, to be enrolled in at least one 3-credit college course, even if that course begins in the fall 2026 term. That creates a clear campus-based selection model, but it still depends on universities keeping clubs active, coaches developing doubles partnerships and programs finding the money to send players abroad.

If those pieces hold, Malaga will be remembered not just as a debut, but as the point where U.S. university padel began to look like a real feeder system.