‘It’s the absolute strictest regime’: Quarantine rules for Australian Open players and support staff revealed

With more than 1200 tennis players and support staff set to arrive in Melbourne on charter flights this week ahead of the Australian Open, the state government has unveiled its quarantine plan for the arrivals.

It comes amid mounting calls for the tournament to be postponed after two players competing in the qualifying tournament in Doha tested positive to COVID-19.

All arrivals will be tested before boarding flights to Australia.

Upon arrival, they’ll be housed at three CBD hotels for two weeks — The Grant Hyatt, the View on St Kilda Road and Pullman at Albert Park.

Anyone who returns a positive result on the plane will be put into one of Melbourne’s regular quarantine hotels.

Players must test negative on two days after arrival before they can attend training, and will be required to have daily COVID-19 tests.

They will be required to stay in their rooms when not attending training and may only have one support person accompany them to training.

Players will be paired in training bubbles for the duration of their quarantine.

Those caught flouting the rules will face fines of up to $20,000.

Victorian Emergency Services Minister Lisa Neville says she “has a great deal of confidence” in the preparations that have been outlined despite scepticism from the public.

“A massive amount of work has been done around the model, public health advice, the safety, and that has been reassessed up until literally yesterday when the Chief Health Officer signed it off ,” She told Heidi Murphy, filling in for Tom Elliott on 3AW Drive.

“At the moment my head is only in how do we make sure there is no breach from these tennis players out of hotel quarantine.

“We are well and truly ready for this.”

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