Three coronavirus cases have been detected among charter flights carrying tennis players, coaches and officials to Melbourne ahead of the Australian Open, health authorities and tournament organizers said Saturday. Forty-seven players from the two affected flights - arriving from Los Angeles and Abu Dhabi - are now in a strict 14-day quarantine, unable to leave their hotel rooms or practice. Health authorities said two positive COVID-19 cases emerged from a charter flight from Los Angeles.
Forty-seven players were barred from practising for a fortnight Saturday in a major setback to their Australian Open preparations after passengers on two charter flights that brought them to Melbourne tested positive to Covid-19.
The build-up to next month's Australian Open was thrown into disarray on Saturday when 47 players were forced into two weeks of strict hotel quarantine after coronavirus infections were reported on two chartered flights carrying them to Melbourne. Two dozen players and their staff landed from Los Angeles to go into quarantine after an aircrew member and a passenger, who was not a player, tested positive for COVID-19. A further 23 players arriving by a chartered flight from Abu Dhabi met a similar fate after another non-player passenger was found positive, the organisers of the year's first grand slam said in a statement.