Carreño and his companions remain practically locked in their hotel rooms. The man from Gijón related it like this on Monday on his Instagram account“Here we are still in the room in Melbourne where we are quarantining, we have not left for three and a half days, in which I have had four PCRs. They have already given me the result of three that have been negative. Yesterday was the first day we were going to be able to train, but they had a problem with the buses that were going to take us to the slopes and the training was canceled so I couldn’t leave the room either ”.
One day later Carreño also had problems: “I was supposed to be training for half an hour but they have had a problem and they are disinfecting the entire hotel and no one can leave the rooms. So we’re late again. ”
Finally, with delay, Pablo was able to carry out his first shared training session with Feliciano López but they did not get rid of great security measures to the point that it was forbidden to change sides of the track. The Australian Open is normally played in January, but this year it has been delayed a month although tennis players have had to travel much earlier to comply with an obligatory and strict quarantine. The rules oblige them to be in their respective rooms except for five hours a day in order to train.
Each player is assigned a code daily with which to access the court, the gym or even order food. The protocol is so strict that something as seemingly normal as opening the door of the room and talking to someone in the hall can result in a fine of 20,000 Australian dollars, about 12,785.70 euros. The regulations are very demanding but Melbourne adds 14 days in a row without a single positive and the authorities want the streak to be extended.
Carreño will start the competition as part of the Spanish team for the ATP Cup that will be held in Melbourne from February 1 to 5
The tennis players protest their situation but the residents of the Westin hotel where the players are are not very happy with having them there. Even the owners of 36 luxury apartments at that hotel are considering filing a lawsuit against Tennis Australia for using the building for quarantine. And that, according to the plan prepared, the players have separate entrances and are at different levels, there are monitors at each level and even the police watch 24 hours a day so that everyone complies with the regulations.
Carreño will start the competition as part of the Spanish team for the ATP Cup which will be played in Melbourne from February 1 to 5 and that precedes the Australian Open that will be played between 8 and 21 and which the Asturian tennis player is seeded 15th.
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