The US Open, traditionally the fourth Grand Slam round of the season in the calendar, will take place on the scheduled dates, from August 31 to September 13 at Flushing Meadows, but behind closed doors, announced Tuesday Andrew Cuomo the governor of New York State.
“The American Tennis Federation will take extraordinary precautions to protect players and staff, including strong testing, additional cleaning of the venue, additional locker room space, dedicated accommodation and transportation,” he said. posted on Twitter this Tuesday evening.
It now remains to convince many major players extremely dubious, like Novak Djokovic, to play this Grand Slam tournament, long threatened by the coronavirus. The game is not won in advance.
The @usopen will be held in Queens, NY, without fans from August 31 to September 13.
The USTA will take extraordinary precautions to protect players and staff, including robust testing, additional cleaning, extra locker room space, and dedicated housing & transportation.
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) June 16, 2020
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Djokovic denounces “extreme conditions”
In the meantime, the USTA has therefore obtained, as it hoped, the green light from the authorities for the holding of its major event, after seeing its plan approved by the ATP and WTA circuits, as several media said on Monday. . This plan, which remains to be formalized this week, includes eliminating the singles qualifications and reducing the doubles table from 64 pairs to 24.
The American Tennis Federation has also obtained to move the Masters 1000 from Cincinnati (August 16-23) to Flushing Meadows, to follow it up with the US Open. This constitutes a new “double header”, almost a month long, in order to concentrate the players in New York without making them travel. Participants should, for those coming from abroad, observe a fortnight upon their arrival and all would be confined to hotels near John Fitzgerald Kennedy Airport.
In addition, in the heart of the city, which has been most affected by the pandemic in the United States, they could only be accompanied by a member of their entourage. “Extreme conditions”, deplored last week the Serbian Novak Djokovic, world number one, judging “impossible” to go there in his complete staff, trainer, trainer, physiotherapist.
Not to mention that just behind, will follow Roland-Garros (September 20-October 4). With what that will imply of parameters to manage, fatigue, transatlantic flight, change of surface. Frenchman Lucas Pouille has already announced that he could ignore it. And he is far from alone.
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