Two-Time Australian Open doubles champion Timea Babos to miss the event over COVID-19 rules

Hungary’s Timea Babos says she will not play at next month’s Australian Open due to uncertainty over the procedures regarding COVID-19.

Timea Babos won the Australian Open doubles crown twice in her career (2018, 2020) yet the Hungarian will miss the 2022 edition. The 28-year-old former world No.1 doubles player issued a statement on Instagram in which she said she, ‘cannot identify with the Australian government’s COVID-19 measures.’ Babos’ decision not to play isn’t due to her vaccination status.

Instead, the rules regarding potential positive cases at the event have not been made clear and there is a lot of ambiguity. The threat of possible quarantine and the ongoing developments regarding the virus has put her off attending. She explained:

"I’m not financially well with this decision, but money, success is not everything. I simply cannot identify with the Australian Government’s epidemiological measures, the possible quarantine obligation, and the Covid camps are also deterred. What happens if there is a case of coronavirus in the tournament? Are contacts being blocked again or excluded from the competition like at the 2020 US Open? There is no regular information about this, so all the hard work would go to the trash if you had to spend two weeks in quarantine.”