Niesly Piron, tennis coach and padel court construction supervisor
If today, drugs circulate in the four corners of the island, trafficking began in the working-class towns. Niesly Piron, born to separated parents and raised by his grandmother, grew up in the Briqueterie city. Members of his family, who were involved in trafficking, tried to make him a dealer at an age when he was still easily influenced. Fortunately he had discovered a love for tennis and the sport was his lifeline. Today, Niesly Piron is not only a tennis coach but he also supervises the installation of padel courts on behalf of O2 Padel Pro. Portrait of a thirty-year-old who has the drive to succeed in life.
Niesly Piron, 37, was born in Ste Croix. His late father José sang in hotels and even participated in the show “Sofe Ravann”. His mother, Marie-Josée, was a housewife. His parents divorced when he was four years old and he was taken in by his grandmother Mimose Nany. Although she cannot read, she encourages her grandson to go to school. Niesly Piron attended several schools but did not go beyond Form IV because although he liked his studies moderately, he did not like the atmosphere of the school. His grandfather, who is a taxi driver, tries his hand at exporting clothing to Reunion Island. And went bankrupt. The family must therefore move to live on Enniskilen Street in Port-Louis.
At 15, Niesly Piron learned that tennis was being taught on a voluntary basis at the Champ de Mars. He goes there. The test fascinates him and he decides to put all his energy into it. His grandmother bought him a tennis racket as she could afford and the young boy not only trains at Solitude with Bruno Lebon, coach at the Tennis Federation, but also practices in “hitting the ball on the garage wall of the house.”
Having grown up alone and wanting to be part of a group as he searched for himself, at 17, he approached parents, initially unaware that several of them were drug dealers. They try to recruit him into their circle by telling him that sport will not bring him much while with selling drugs, he will earn large sums of money without much effort. Niesly Piron, who followed his grandmother’s good advice, clings to tennis like a lifeline.
He was noticed in the field by a member of the Ah Chuen family of ABC Motors and they offered him his “first real tennis racket. It changed my game and gave me confidence, motivating me to improve further.” While he was training at Solitude, Philippe Lemoine, the Frenchman who was number 3 at Roland Garros, and who was at the time National Technical Director at the Mauritius Tennis Federation, brought him to Petit Camp to train. . He does it four hours a day with a coach and two to three times a week, the Malagasy coach Jean-Marc Randriamanalina gives him free lessons for an hour. Niesly Piron throws himself fully into this sport. After a year and a half, he played for the Avenir de Maurice team in Petit Camp and then for the national team. He was then among the ten best players on the island.
As he did not have the means to follow training abroad, it took him seven years to become a coach. With the Federation, he participated in a tournament in Reunion and several tournaments in Mauritius. Philippe Lemoine trained him and this is how he obtained his State Certificate of Sports Coach (BECS 1) and certification from the International Tennis Federation.
For 17 years, Niesly Piron trained children and adults first at the Tennis Federation and then on behalf of Ace Tennis. Wanting to become self-employed, he left the club and gave lessons in hotels, while doing odd jobs on the side in mechanics and construction. When his best friend, Matteo Zinno, who is also a tennis coach, forms the MTA academy, the latter recruits him and he becomes his right-hand man. Based in Azuri at the time, they both gave tennis lessons. One of their students, Hirad, tells them about padel. The two friends researched the subject thoroughly and Matteo Zinno decided to import the structures and all the equipment to install padel courts in Mauritius. He then created the company O2 Padel Pro and entrusted responsibility for supervising the installation of padel courts to Niesly Piron. He recruits and manages a team of 11 men.
O2 Padel Pro installs the first padel court in Azuri and quickly, orders are pouring in both from individuals and hotels (more than 40 courts in the Indian Ocean). Niesly Piron got the hang of it quickly and if at the start it took him and the team a month to install a professional level padel court, today it only takes them a week to do it. He must also take care of the maintenance of the padel courts. “If players play seven hours a day on a padel court, the court must undergo maintenance every two months.”
Since last May, the MTA academy and O2 Padel Pro are no longer based in Azuri but in several locations on the island, notably at Synergy, Moka, at the Racing Club de Maurice and at the Dodo Club. Niesly Piron is pleasantly surprised by the enthusiasm generated by padel. A sport which, according to him, is easier to master than tennis. “If a person has some knowledge of badminton or squash, they can learn to play padel in three weeks. On the other hand, to be a good tennis player, you need at least a year of training.”
Installing padel courts takes up practically all of his time. But Niesly Piron wants to keep his good tennis clients. “I can’t stop tennis completely. I will miss it too much.” Married to Jessica, who is a beautician at home, Niesly Piron, who is very aware of the ravages of drugs in the housing estates renamed residences, tried to prevent certain young people he knows from taking this bad turn by offering to hire them as workers at O2 Padel Pro. But in vain. “They’re outright saying that what they can make in two days on drugs, they’ll have to work two months to get. Today in many residences, many young people want to have an easy life. It’s hard to convince them to earn an honest living.”
That doesn’t stop him from trying. Although he is sad that his grandmother turned a blind eye forever before seeing his success, he at least knows that his parents are proud of him. There’s something there.
