The New York Atlantics — one of the most recent teams to join the North American Pro Padel League (PPL) — are coming out swinging heading into the 2024 season with today’s announcement that they’ve signed three of the top 10 players in the world along with a 14-time world number one.
To date the team has landed five top international players including Federico Chingotto, Virginia Riera, Tamara Icardo, Juan Martín Díaz, and Lucas Campagnolo for the upcoming 2024 season.
Chingotto, who ranks seventh internationally, is the highest-ranked player to ever join the PPL. “The sport of padel has exploded in recent years, and I have had the pleasure of competing at the highest level,” the Argentine star says. “I look forward to bringing this level of competition to North America with the Atlantics.”
Meanwhile, Riera and Icardo are currently partners on the international circuits and rank eighth and ninth in the world, respectively.
Riera, a defensive player who loves counter-attacking and changes of pace, was the first Argentinian player to win a World Padel Tour title since 2014. This broke a seven-year national drought for the country. Icardo is a legend in València, Spain, and won a European gold medal for her country in addition to two World Padel Tour titles in Santander (2021) and her hometown of València (2023).
“It is a privilege to be part of the early wave of padel in the United States, and this is only the beginning,” said Icardo. “To join the Atlantics is incredibly exciting, and to do it with Virginia makes it all the more special.”
Díaz, who was announced as a strategic advisor to the team earlier this year, is a 14-time world-number-one player from Argentina and is widely considered one of the best — and most accomplished — players in the history of the sport, with an incredible 170 international tournament titles to his name.
Finally, there is Brazilian-born Campagnolo — who has been ranked as high as number 21 worldwide and currently competes on the international circuit with Spanish partner Javier Garrido Gómez. Campagnolo is known as an intelligent player who is capable of playing on the drive and on the backhand side, which makes him an incredibly valuable player in the PPL format.
The Atlantics will continue to build out their roster with a player draft set for early 2024. Each PPL team roster, when finalized, will consist of eight players – two male, two female, and up to four alternate players. And given the Atlantics’ early signings, the pressure is certainly on across the league to attract more of the world’s top talent to the new global hotbed of padel here in the U.S.
