MELBOURNE, Australia – From the banks of the Yarra River to the vineyards of the Mornington Peninsula, news from muggy Melbourne Park shivered the state of Victoria.
An employee of one of the hotels where players and officials were quarantined prior to the Australian Open had tested positive for the coronavirus. The announcement, made late Wednesday, had an annoying echo for Melburnians who endured three lockdowns, including one that took 111 days, to successfully suppress the coronavirus.
“There is no reason for people to panic,” Daniel Andrews, Victoria’s prime minister, said Thursday. But in many circles in this city that button was already pressed. The first tennis major each year is the crown jewel on this country’s sports calendar, but even before the positive result broke the community’s 28-day streak of zero transfer, many Australians seemed to be in conflict over the progress of the event .
Ian Hickie, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Sydney, said Australia closed the country last year – at enormous costs to the economy and people’s mental health – “so that we can see the physical health disaster of North America and Europe and the south are spared. America. “
Risking returning those hard-won profits “just doesn’t make sense outside of a very narrow business sector,” he said, adding, “I think it’s safe to say most people are furious that it continues.”
The letter headlines of Australian newspapers in recent weeks have become a Greek chorus, with readers lamenting the hypocrisy of welcoming international visitors while still excluding Australian citizens trapped abroad and the dissonance of public health and public health preaching. safety, while seeming to prioritize a world showcase event.
The tournament planned to allow up to 30,000 paying fans a day on the grounds, but the positive test prompted some cardholders to ask for a refund on Twitter.
Six men’s and women’s tune-up events in Melbourne Park have been suspended on Thursday, with matches moving to Friday. The draw for the Australian Open was also postponed by one day to Friday. Craig Tiley, the CEO of Tennis Australia, remained determined that the Australian Open would start on Monday as planned.
“This isn’t about no risk,” said Tiley. ‘There is no such thing as no risk. There are always risks. The goal is to minimize it as much as possible. “
Restrictions on travel to a landlocked country have helped Australia get and keep much of the virus under control. There were 52 active cases of coronavirus in the country and nine people in hospital on Thursday. With a population of 25.8 million people – about four million more than there are in Florida – Australia has had 28,838 cases and 909 deaths from the virus.
That more than 1,200 visitors associated with the Australian Open, including those from countries where variants of the virus were found to be more transmissible, were given exceptions to enter the country, Hickie surprised. “Our social cohesion and cooperation is not something you can buy, and the feeling that some people are just more important than others is a very un-Australian concept,” he said.
In mid-January, when the players began their mandatory 14-day quarantine – some more cheerful than others – Australians seemed divided. Some aligned with tennis and government officials who saw Victoria as a liberator who saved international sport from the tyranny of the pandemic. Others felt that Australia’s reputation as one of the leading virus control nations was more respected than its reputation as one of tennis’s four Grand Slam hosts.
“There’s a big deal with forest fires,” Hickie said. ‘You went to bed and the forest fire was under control, and you woke up and your house was burned down. The idea that you can control this virus has turned out to be a misconception worldwide and we are not out of the crisis yet. But Victoria takes great pride in the collective effort to get it right. “
For Melburnians who have repeatedly and resolutely sacrificed personal comfort and convenience for the collective good, it may seem too much to root for individual glory for the sporting elite who have parachuted to their city for five weeks.
Darren Scammell, who stopped as he walked across Federation Square, a normally busy meeting place in Melbourne’s central business district, said he had tickets to a session during the second week of the Open.
“I really hope that in Victoria we can catch the outbreak because we really hope to be there,” said Scammell, who works as an auditor, adding that the players had generally not impressed him much.
“They are prima donna’s,” he said, “and that’s not an Australian thing.”
Ashleigh Barty from Australia, the number 1 woman in the world, said she felt for Melburnians like Scammell. “They’ve had an extremely difficult period in the last six or 12 months, probably the toughest of any state around Australia,” she said.
Barty, a Queenslander who did not participate in 2020 after February due to the pandemic, said she had not seen her Victoria-based coach for more than six months due to interstate border restrictions. She finds it remarkable that the tennis world was given the green light to converge at Melbourne for this year’s Australian Open, and just three weeks later than the original date.
“It’s proof to everyone down here, respecting the rules and living by the rules set by the government,” Barty said.
On Sunday, Perth, in Western Australia, started a five-day lockdown after a hotel worker tested positive for the virus in quarantine. Three days later, Australian Nick Kyrgios, the 47th seeded men’s player who also didn’t play after February 2020, was asked if he was concerned that the same could happen in Melbourne.
“Yeah, I mean, I don’t want it to happen anywhere,” said Kyrgios, adding, “There’s too much risk in all of this. I don’t understand what’s so hard to understand for tennis players. You’re just a tennis player. You know what I mean? It’s not life and death like this. “
A few hours after Kyrgios spoke, Andrews imposed tighter restrictions in Victoria, but stopped at a lockdown. He limited home meetings to no more than 15 people, mandated the wearing of masks indoors and postponed an extension of office capacity limits that would take effect next week.
“This is a case,” he said, adding, “People need not be alarmed.”
In a video call during the quarantine, Tiley said the dark moments of isolation would be followed by an event that would entertain fans and do so safely.
“You end up going, ‘Oh my god, I can’t believe we all achieved that.’ And that’s when we’re working on it, “Tiley said.” If we have huge interruptions that don’t get us that far, that’s a shame. But I don’t think that’s going to happen. “