The bumpy start in the Australian tennis weeks - Kerber is now also affected by regular quarantine
In the midst of the crowd of players who due to positive COVID-19 cases on the flights to Down Under is Germany's number one: Angelique Kerber.
by Jörg Allmeroth
last edit: Jan 17, 2021, 06:47 pm
From her hotel room in the "Grand Hyatt", Angelique Kerber has a very sublime view of Melbourne these days. When she had just arrived on a charter flight from Abu Dhabi in the metropolis of the Australian state of Victoria on Friday, she soon sent a photo for her Internet fan base, which showed her against the background of the skyscraper canyons. Kerber wrote that she will now go into the mandatory 14-day quarantine, interrupted only by the five hours a day during which tennis training and other exercise programs for the Australian Open are possible. All in all, it was "not a bad start", ended the little message on the Internet to her fan base.
In the meantime, the situation has become a little more complicated, but not really bad for Kerber and the rest of the traveling tennis circus. After corona infections had been registered on several charter flights, which were specially provided by the Grand Slam organizers in Los Angeles and the Middle East , a good 60 players had to go into regular quarantine . Kerber and the other tennis professionals are now not allowed to leave their hotel room for a fortnight, and only at the end of January will they be able to prepare for the first major tournament of the season for a week. Kerber took up the disturbance with the usual pragmatism and promised to make "the best" of the situation.
Artem Sitak "Voice of Reason"
Kerber would certainly have resisted the impression that it was now a "quarantine shock" or "corona chaos" in Melbourne. Such headlines were popular at the weekend, but the supposedly special quarantine for the approximately 60 tennis professionals is just the quarantine that absolutely every person entering Australia currently has to undergo - including Australian citizens themselves who are returning to the fifth continent after an odyssey of months allowed to. On his Instagram channel, the New Zealand double specialist Artem Sitak turned out to be the voice of reason: He reminded his colleagues what "Australia had to go through in the time of a month-long lockdown" and how privileged it was to host the tournament in these times be. In addition, it was clear to every player that unforeseen complications could arise at any time. Apparently not all of them had listened carefully to the meetings beforehand; he was amazed "how few people were there at all."
The spoiled complaints of some professional players about the injustice of the quarantine hit a public that is more than skeptical about the Grand Slam spectacle in Melbourne in these exceptional times. Victoria's Prime Minister Dan Andrews, who gave the green light for the tournament in February after lengthy negotiations with Tennis Australia and Grand Slam boss Craig Tiley, is under heavy attack from large parts of the population, the political opposition and other local government leaders. Which has to do with the fact that almost 40,000 desperate Australians around the world are still waiting to return to their home country, while an exclusive airlift has now been established for the 1,200 members of the so-called tennis family.
Criticism of the event does not stop
Under the hashtag #strandedaussies, family members and stranded people could clearly vent their anger on tennis charter flights even before the corona cases. Incidentally, one of the most prominent critics of the Australian Open special route is the head of Qantas, Australia as the crow flies, Alan Joyce. He condemned the state support as “politically bizarre”, with “destructive” consequences for social cohesion. After the contingents for returning Australians were suddenly cut by 50 percent again because of the virus mutations, Qantas competitor Emirates, to make matters worse, cut most of the important connections to Australia.
No wonder that the otherwise sport-crazy Australians and Australian Open fans find it not much fun when some professionals in the Internet universe complain about the quality of the food in the quarantine period. Or lamented that after one or two corona cases in the charter jets, all other passengers have to go into isolation. The first slight violations of the tougher quarantine requirements (some professionals opened their hotel rooms to communicate with each other) were noted with additional displeasure.
Social media users pointed out that at the end of the self-chosen trip, paid for by the Grand Slam organizers, in the Australian midsummer, a prize money of 100,000 dollars would be available for every first-round loser in the individual in Melbourne. Many thousands of Australians feared for their bare existence in the midst of unemployment and financial difficulties. It is not the time, according to tennis pro Simak from New Zealand, "to get excited about the little things", but to be happy "to be here in Melbourne under these circumstances."