The feeling of being on January 2 and still not having live tennis is rare. No exhibitions, no previous phases, nothing. We will still have to wait until Monday the 4th for the first draws of the pictures to take place and thus begin to kill the tennis bug. But it will be rarer still to follow the Qualy of the Open de Australia… Away from Australia! An event to be held in two cities (the men in Doha, women in Dubai) from next day 10 until day 13. An unprecedented route to which many players will have to adapt, especially local tennis players.
And is that the month of January, at least in the men’s circuit, was synonymous with a long ‘vacation’ in Australia. Whether it was to play in Perth, Adelaide or any other city near Melbourne, where the end of the party will end. This year the preliminary phase will be a few kilometers away, although we know that the organization of the event fought until the last moment for the Qualy to be played in Sydney or Brisbane. Finally, the increase in COVID-19 cases in New South Wales forced many borders to close and the government decided to protect itself for the summer. It was time for a change of plans, it was time to head to the Middle East.
“The truth is that we are facing a unique situation, where we will have to travel abroad to compete,” he confesses Wally Masur in a report prepared by The Age. “It has been an unusual year for all the players, so those who manage to adapt faster will be the ones with the best results,” sums up the current Tennis Australia performance director. In total, a total of 1,100 people will fly to Doha and Dubai after undergoing a mandatory two-week quarantine. You may read this and it still seems crazy to you, but each step is supported by caution and the idea of avoiding any type of risk.
And what does this look like to the players? “This is a Grand Slam, it is not just any tournament. Playing these types of tournaments do not happen very often, so I am very grateful to have the opportunity to play it ”, celebrates Storm Sanders, another of the tennis players who will compete in that previous phase. “At no point did I have any doubt that if I got the invitation to go to Dubai, I would be there. I didn’t think twice. I know that Tennis Australia is making a great effort to organize everything, even the quarantine, so that we can all train and use the gym during it ”, values the Australian, who will have to fight away from home if she wants to get the prize of settling in the final picture.
After much struggle, players will have the option to train for five hours a day during their quarantine, all thanks to an agreement signed by Tennis Australia a few weeks ago. Tennis shows in this way that you are more than prepared to survive in a pandemic. “I know they are going to be very strict, we do not go there to socialize with anyone, we just go to do each training, practice on the track and then go back to your hotel room,” Sanders supports again. “All the tournaments we played last year were in a bubble, where you were only allowed out of the room to go to dinner. Here it will be the same, it is an express order from the government, so we will not be allowed to leave the room ”, he concludes.
Between the previous and the final picture, a new quarantine
Another who will fight to sneak into the main draw will be Jason Kubler, although he is the first to understand the problems that can generate to dispute the Qualy in one place and the final painting in another. “I am a bit worried because I don’t know what the final situation will be. For example, putting myself in the case of losing in the previous phase, I would have to go back and do a two-week quarantine in which I cannot leave the room. Go back to Melbourne no matter what happens in Doha. I am hopeful that this is the beginning of a much better year than the last, a better year for everyone and also for me. Hopefully we can play with total normality ”, declares the Australian.
.
