Timea Babos of Hungary criticized the “injustice” of her exclusion from the US Open on Sunday, the day after she and her doubles partner Kristina Mladenovic were ejected from the tournament.
On Saturday,
Babos and her French partner Mladenovic were told they could not make the double after New York officials ordered Mladenovic to quarantine her.
Mladenovic was one of many players in contact with player Benoit Paire, who retired last Sunday on the eve of the competition after testing positive for coronavirus.
In an Instagram post,
Babos, who had no contact with Paire and was under no obligation to self-quarantine, said she was shocked by the exclusion of her and Mladenovic.
“I’m home. I’m sitting in my kitchen and crying,” Babos wrote.
“I’m just starting to realize what happened and I don’t understand. It’s terribly unfair. I can’t see any reasonable reason why this has happened.”
Babos pointed out that Mladenovic had done several tests for Covid-19 last week and that all of them had tested negative.
“Let’s look at the facts:
Benoit Paire’s positive test was ten days earlier (after 4 negative) and in recent days his results were negative,” Babos said. “Others close to him have never tested positive. Kiki (Mladenovic) had 11 – repeat 11 – negative tests for Covid-19. Yet we were locked up, ”added the 27-year-old Hungarian.
Babos also countered his treatment by the fact that Frenchman Adrian Mannarino – one of those who had been in contact with Paire – was cleared to play against Alexander Zverev in the third round on Friday.
“On Friday they did everything possible to make sure Mannarino could play.
He was allowed to play and the next day we weren’t. It is simply an injustice! Incomprehensible! This is not true. ”
Babos said she had two opinions on whether to participate in this year’s US Open, which several players ignored citing concerns over COVID-19.
“I was asking myself a lot of questions,” he says.
“But I’m an athlete, I want to compete. They robbed us of the chance to lift a Grand Slam trophy, not to mention the material side and the psychological damage! But why? I don’t know, I don’t understand.”
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