Players ‘outraged’ by Melbourne quarantine
The organisers of next month’s Australian Open came under fire yesterday after 47 players found themselves in a new and stricter form of lockdown at their Melbourne hotels.
Those affected will no longer be able to leave the hotel to train, as previously hoped, because three fellow travellers to Australia tested positive for Covid-19.
According to the Italian journalist Luca Fiorino, a group of players were said to have broken out of their rooms in protest, with security guards warning the culprits that they could be deported if they did so again.
Many players feel it is unjust that a handful of elite stars — including Naomi Osaka, Novak Djokovic and
Rafael Nadal — are not in Melbourne at all, but have flown to Adelaide, where conditions are more relaxed and flexible.
Philipp Oswald told Tennisnet. com that Daniil Medvedev and Alexander Zverev, for example, were only allowed to take two support staff with them, while Dominic Thiem, Nadal and Djokovic each travelled with 10 people.
Players in Melbourne whose incoming flights were free of any positive tests can make use of a fivehour daily window in which they may leave the hotel, spend two hours on the practice courts and 90 minutes in the gym.
But for those who travelled on the two affected planes — from Los Angeles and Abu Dhabi — the next two weeks will have to be spent exclusively inside their rooms, with many expressing their dismay on social media.
Those complaints were countered by those — especially Melburnians — who said that the influx of 1270 tennis-related travellers could trigger a new outbreak and that they were behaving in an entitled and arrogant manner.
Sylvain Bruneau, who works with 2019 US Open champion Bianca Andreescu, identified himself as the person on the Abu Dhabi flight who had tested positive.
He said: “I am extremely saddened and sorry for the consequences now on everyone’s shoulders.”
Unless Tennis Australia can find a solution, the 47 players will come out of quarantine at the end of the month, just over a week before the start of the Australian Open on February 8.
— Telegraph Group UK