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DPA
Sydney
The 72 Australian Open tennis players forced into 14 days of strict hotel quarantine in Melbourne will not be receiving special treatment, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said on Monday.
The stern rejection came after world number one Novak Djokovic reportedly sent a letter to Tennis Australia boss Craig Tiley with a list of demands regarding players’ quarantine conditions.
The competitors and their entourages were placed into isolation, unable to leave their hotel rooms to train, after several people on three Australian Open charter flights tested positive for Covid-19.
The Australian Open is scheduled to begin on February 8. Organizers said the event would go ahead as planned.
“People are free to provide lists of demands but the answer is no,” Andrews told reporters in Melbourne.  “I know that there’s been a bit of chatter from a number of players about the rules. Well, the rules apply to them as they apply to everybody else, and they were all briefed on that before they came...
There’s no special treatment here. Because the virus doesn’t treat you specially. So neither do we.” Andrews announced a further four positive cases had been linked to the flights, including an unnamed player, bringing the total to nine.
The three Australian Open charter flights were from Abu Dhabi, Doha and Los Angeles.
According to a report by Spanish tennis website Punto de Break, Djokovic’s demands included fewer days in isolation, the option to isolate in a private houses and better food.
All players were already obligated to undergo a two-week quarantine on arrival in Australia, but they were granted an exemption to train outside for several hours a day.
Those on the affected flights will not be allowed out of their room at all for two weeks.
Among the players having to quarantine is former Australian Open champion and world number one Angelique Kerber of Germany, who tweeted Saturday that she was aboard the flight from Abu Dhabi.
Some players have taken to Twitter to vent their frustration over the 14 days of full isolation.
“What I don’t understand is that, why no-one ever told us, if one person on board is positive the whole plane need to be isolated... I would think twice before coming here,” Kazakh player Yulia Putintseva tweeted on Saturday.
The 26-year-old also posted a video of a mouse in her room.
French tennis star Alize Cornet on Monday apologized for a weekend Twitter rant in which she described the restrictions as “insane.” “After my last (deleted) tweet I feel like I need to apologize to you Australian people,” Cornet wrote.
“Your reaction to this tactless comment made me realize what you’ve been through last year & how much you suffered. I guess I feel a bit anxious about all this & I better have shut my mouth.” Last year, some 4.9 million residents across metropolitan Melbourne endured a 112-day lockdown in a bid to curb an escalating second wave of the pandemic. The majority of the strict restrictions were lifted in late October.
On Monday, Melbourne recorded its 12th consecutive day of zero community transmitted cases of Covid-19. The only new infections were the four Australian Open international arrivals - all in hotel quarantine.
Australia’s Covid-19 quarantine commissioner Emma Cassar on Sunday said that some of the players in quarantine were “testing our procedures” and risked facing fines up to 20,000 Australian dollars (15,300 US dollars). She cited the example of a player who opened his hotel door to talk with someone down the corridor.
Cassar also said that all the individuals who needed to travel to Australia for the tournament have now arrived.
Djokovic was heavily criticised for organising the Adria Tour exhibition in Serbia amid the coronavirus pandemic in June.
The mini-tour was scrapped before the final of the second leg in Croatia when several players and coaches became infected with the coronavirus - Djokovic among them.
Although no local rules were broken at the time, players did not observe social distancing or a hygiene protocol and were pictured partying a nightclub.
Djokovic has described the backlash he received over the controversial tour as a “witch hunt.”
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19/01/2021
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