On Monday, if there are no more setbacks preventing it, it will start the hardest Australian Open of all. First, it had to be postponed for three weeks to allow tennis players to arrive and do the mandatory two-week quarantine. Afterwards, the players who arrived in some of the infected planes had to undergo stricter confinement, unable to leave the room for two weeks and, finally, when tennis was already in motion in Melbourne, the positive of a worker of a hotel forced to confine 600 people waiting for all to give negative. So it was. Three weeks after the start of the ocean adventure, Melbourne Park opens its doors to the third Grand Slam since the pandemic, the one who will breathe more normally.
After a US Open without an audience and a Roland Garros played in October and with the testimonial presence of fans, Australia shows its credentials as a model country in the control of the coronavirus. “I have healthy envy of how well things are being done here”, reflected forcefully Rafa Nadal. With about 30,000 people per day on the premises, Melbourne aspires to give away the best snapshot of world tennis -Adriá Tour by Novak Djokovic aside- since everything stopped in March 2020. And it is in this scenario where Nadal dreams of getting once and for all the double, the one that is has escaped four times (2012, 2014, 2017 and 2019) and that would make him the first tennis player in the history of the Open era to win every Grand Slam at least twice.
It will not be easy, since the Spaniard reaches this point of the preparation quite upset. He got off to a good start at the Adelaide display played a week ago, where he was able to beat Dominic Thiem, his executioner on these tracks last year, but the ATP Cup has not served as a shuttle. The manacorense suffered some discomfort in his lower back before the start of the team tournament and has not been able to play for a minute. In principle it was only going to affect him for the debut against Australia, but he did not let him compete against Greece either. “I’m not bad, but I’m not good enough to compete either,” Nadal said after not playing against the Australians.
With days ahead of him still to recover, Nadal sees a debut against Laslo Djere, world number 56, a tennis player who, a priori, should not pose a serious problem, with clay as his fetish surface and without ever having faced a ‘ top 5 ‘. The Spanish was lucky in the draw and the first rounds would not have to be more than a mere formality if Nadal is physically well. Only in the round of 16, where the figure of Alex de Miñaur emerges, can he begin to show his claws. Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quarterfinals, Daniil Medvedev in the semifinals and Novak Djokovic mark the project of cementing the second Australian Open, the first in the last twelve years.
The same goal pursued by Djokovic, who has won eight times in Melbourne – more than anyone in history – and who can shorten the fence with Nadal and Roger Federer – absent – to just two ‘majors’. Thiem, finalist in Melbourne and champion in New York; Medvedev, teacher in London; and Alexander Zverev, a finalist in the United States, will try to surprise in a territory that has been named after Djokovic in recent years.
Regarding the female category, Garbiñe Muguruza will try to repeat and, why not, improve what he achieved last year, when he reached his first Grand Slam final outside of London and Paris. The Spanish player has started the season on the right foot, with the great result in the Melbourne preparation tournament, although her discreet ranking of number 15 puts a complicated picture, with the possibility of measuring Paula Badosa in the second round, Angelique Kerber in third and Naomi Osaka, champion in 2019, in the quarterfinals.
Carlos Alcaraz’s first Grand Slam
After a failed attempt at Roland Garros, where he fell in the qualifying phase, the promise Carlos Alcaraz will debut in his first Grand Slam. The Murcian, a pupil of Juan Carlos Ferrero, will debut in Melbourne after having passed the previous one that was played in Dubai a month ago. The reality that the 17-year-old has become is already knocking at the door of tennis and it does so with more force after having been seen in the preparation tournament that has been played these days in the same facilities of the Australian Open . There, Alcaraz defeated Attila Balazs, the fourth ‘top 100’ of his career, and David Goffin, his first ‘top 15’. Enough to get into the top 140 in the world just before the most important championship of his life. «He hits the ball very hard. He has annihilated me, ”Goffin said after taking on him.
Carlos Alcaraz’s progression takes another leap, despite falling to Thiago Monteiro in the round of 16, and he does so after strict confinement as the plane in which he traveled to Melbourne was infected. In total, 14 days without being able to leave his room and without being able to train properly, after which he practically had to jump onto the track without preparation. «In quarantine I tried to keep myself physically well. I had a work plan every day and I followed it to the letter. It has helped me to be physically well in this pre-Grand Slam tournament. My tennis level is where I want and I want to move on », declared the Spanish to the ATP. His first victory in a Grand Slam will be sought against the Dutch Botic Van de Zandschulp, number 159 in the world.
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