The coach for Simona Halep said the proposed coronavirus protocols for the US Open are “incredibly difficult” and probably won’t work for the world No. 2 player.
“The restrictions are tough. They’re incredibly difficult, and every player will have their own opinion as to whether that will work for them. I’m pretty sure that won’t work for Simona,” Darren Cahill told Reuters in a telephone interview from Australia.
Some of proposals include charter flights to ferry players and limited entourages from Europe, South America and the Middle East to New York. Negative COVID-19 tests before traveling. Centralized housing, no locker room access on practice days and daily temperature checks, Stacey Allaster, the U.S. Tennis Association’s chief executive for professional tennis, told The Associated Press in May.
The US Open is scheduled to begin on Aug. 31. The French Open was postponed to September and Wimbledon was canceled because of the pandemic.
“From Simona’s point of view, you got to fly over from Romania, you need to spend four weeks in this one hotel in New York, and you can only bring one person,” Cahill said of the two-time major winner.
“Normally you have a physio, a hitting partner, trainer and maybe a coach or two. You’ve got to basically stay in this bubble with only one person for three or four weeks, and you have to be professional and compete at the highest level.
“So now there are going to be a lot of players that have an issue with that for sure.”
On Monday, world No. 1 Novak Djokovic said it would be “impossible” to play the US Open under the proposed protocols.
“They want the tournament to go ahead at any cost for economic reasons, which I understand,” Djokovic told Serbia’s Prva TV. “But the question is, how many players are willing to accept those terms?”
Cahill hopes the situation with the coronavirus improves to the point that the protocols won’t be necessary.
“We all want to get back to work, so hoping the tennis tour starts out really soon,” he said. “I know the US Open officials are trying their hardest to make it happen.
“A lot changes in two or three days, let alone six or seven weeks. So as time goes on, I think a lot of the restrictions will start to come down.”
Information from Reuters contributed to this report.