A new sport has swept through America and is now making a name for itself in the UK. Now with more than 30 sessions and clubs in the north west, pickleball is here to stay.
The game is traditionally played on a badminton court with hard rackets and a plastic ball. It's popularity is mainly down to the fact it is accessible for all ages and doesn't require lots of equipment.
In the north west, there is a monthly doubles league with nine divisions. This is a fairly new initiative for the sport and has more than doubled in less than 12 months.
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The sport continues to grow, with Pickleball England having more than 2,000 players, although it is widely assumed that the actual number of casual players is over 4,000. Last year, the BBC reported more than 4 million players world wide, citing the pandemic as a contributing factor to the increased interest in the sport.
In Greater Manchester, there are seven pickleball clubs currently registered with pickleball England, one in Salford, Stockport, Rochdale, Leigh, Urmston and two in Bolton.
Robert Rosenfield discovered Pickleball while on a cruise and despite no instruction on how to play, picked up the game very quickly and couldn’t wait to play again once he returned home.
Upon returning, Robert started playing immediately in his nearest club, which happened to be in Wigan. However, since then, he has now started his own club in Bolton.
Currently, his club plays on Saturdays at Smithills school between 11am and 1pm. They only have two courts, but are always happy to welcome new members.
He explained how and why he fell in love with the sport, saying: “I went on a cruise and they had this game, so me, my wife and the kids thought we’d give it a go. There was no one there to explain the rules, but I really got a feel for it and thought, I love this, this is great.
“So when I got back I looked for my nearest club that played it, I found one in Wigan and I fell in love with it and I’ve been playing it ever since.
“It’s the biggest growing sport in America, it's huge over there, they have courts everywhere. It’s not as well known here yet, but it's starting to get a bit of a following.”
He added: "I want to expand it if I can. It’s a really good social, there are serious players in every sport, but the beauty of it is that it’s a sport for everyone. We have 70 year olds, 80 year olds playing in the league.
“The best thing to do is to find your local club, everyone is really welcoming and then get in touch with the club and they’ll be happy to advise on how to get involved. It’s a really good sport to play and a social sport.”
The story of Pickleball goes back to 1965 when two dads, Joel Pritchard and Bob Bell, were holidaying on the island of Bainbridge just off the coast of Seattle, America and accidentally invented the game to alleviate boredom. They were attempting a racket ball sport on a badminton court with table tennis bats and the dog’s ball, whose name was Pickle.
However, others claim the name came from Joel’s wife, Joan, who said the combination of different parts of other games reminded her of the crews of the pickle boats, or small wooden ferry boats whose crews were often the last to be picked.
Elaine Shallcross, north west regional director for Pickleball England, explained how she discovered the game in Thailand, has played all over the world and decided to bring the game home to the north west, starting in Burnley.
She said: “The escalation in the last 12 months, certainly since Covid in a lot of ways, is staggering. We’ve had some great exposure.
“Because of its name, I think pickleball hasn’t been taken as a serious sport, to be honest, but now people are realising it’s a valuable sport in its own merit, even if it’s a derivative of previous sports like tennis, badminton and table tennis.
“We can hardly service demand at the moment. It’s growing that quickly.
“There are a lot of people who have perhaps played tennis or other racket sports that could no longer maintain the physicality of those sports, so pickleball became a fantastic compromise for these people.
Elaine was introduced to pickleball while on holiday in Thailand where she met an ex-international badminton player who had begun playing pickleball in Florida. Elaine began playing in Thailand and has since played in tournaments in Madrid, Kyiv and India.
Upon returning to the north west, Elaine was determined to make a name for the sport in the UK and in 2015, she took the idea of the game to Burnley council. She explained: “I went to Burnley borough council where I used to work, I used to be head of sport and leisure at Burnley, and said ‘I’ve got this great game and you’ve got to try it’. We put it in a 50 plus morning for multi-activities and it snowballed from there.
“We had two sessions during the day and a club in the evening and then we started over at Leigh Sports Village. In the north west, even before Pickleball England existed, I had already taken it onboard myself to be a local ambassador and get as many clubs as possible, so we were in Clitheroe, Longridge and Chorley, Bolton and Wigan.
“Then the game itself got more organised, but my first tournament was in Madrid because there wasn’t one in England then. It’s growing at the rate of knots in other countries as well as over here in England.”
One of the issues pickleball has faced is finding facilities. It is a very versatile sport and can be played on both tennis and badminton courts, both indoors and out.
However, many sports facilities are already booked up with more well known sports and the weather in the north west cannot be trusted.
“You can play outdoors, but what’s usually detrimental in this country is the weather. We don’t always have the best weather. So organising anything like a special event is very difficult because there’s no alternative.
“If we did a Manchester open pickleball championship at whatever tennis club, and it absolutely chucked it down that weekend, you can’t just pick it up and move into a sports centre because there’s availability.”
Despite these worries, Elaine has also noticed an increase in tennis clubs taking an interest in the sport, noting its accessibility for all ages.
She added: “A very recent thing, to be honest, is that the relationship between tennis facilities and clubs and pickleball has been improving rapidly. At one stage, I would say it would have been almost never the two shall meet.
“Now there’s been a realisation that pickleball can help, particularly youngsters, learn some of the basic motor skills that are needed for tennis and transition into tennis.”
