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John Isner Andrey Rublev
Australian Open, Tennis News

‘It wasn’t an easy decision’ – ATP star to skip Australian open due to coronavirus rules


American number one and former world number eight John Isner has announced he will skip the Australian Open due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Players traveling to Australia will be subject to strict quarantine rules for two weeks upon arrival.

That, though, has proven to be a red line for Isner, who says he prefers to spend the time with his family, who would not be able to travel to the Australian Open with him.

“It wasn’t an easy decision at all,” Isner said. “I thought long and hard about it, but I feel comfortable with my decision right now and [I am] looking forward to getting home.”

“At this stage of my career and in my life, I always had visions of being able to travel with my family. Of course, that wouldn’t be the case for Australia this year. Understandably so, I get it,”

“It really was just a situation where I didn’t want to be away from my family for that long. I decided to stay home.”

“I told myself prior to the pandemic that we were going to travel with them as much possible and we were going to make it as much fun as possible on the road.

“When I travel in Europe, I was going to stay at the nicest hotels and just make a really nice trip out of all of it because I won’t be playing tennis forever, there’s no doubt about it.

“Certainly, right now, tennis is not the most important thing in my life. It’s my family.”

Isner, however, has urged people to not mistake his decision for a signal that he is winding down his career.

“Me not going to Australia doesn’t mean that I’m not committed, because I still am,” the 35-year-old said.

“I’m healthy, I feel really good and I’ll continue to take care of my body. Once the Tour gets back from Australia, I look forward to playing as full of a season as I possibly can.”


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Michael Graham, Tennishead.net Editor, has been a professional sports journalist for his whole career and is especially passionate about tennis. He's been the Editor of Tennishead.net for over 5 years and loves watching live tennis by visiting as many tournaments as possible. Michael specialises in writing in-depth features about the ATP & WTA tours.