While Groth admitted the quarantine period would've played a role in a disrupted lead-up, the former world No.53 said it was a "level playing field" for all players, who were forced into some form of quarantine despite some stars copping tougher protocols.<\/p>\n
Watch the Australian Open with live streams of every court at 9Now. Click here to start watching!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n "A lot of them, they weren't able to get fresh air and put shoes on and train on the hardcourt," he told Wide World of Sports.<\/p>\n "So, all the little things you lose. You can do as much as you want in your room, but you can't replicate being on a tennis court \u2013 that muscle memory you get from hitting balls. The tendons, the joints \u2013 how all that feels.<\/p>\n "In terms of quarantine, everyone had to do it, it's a level playing field. Maybe the Aussies have a slight advantage \u2013 they didn't have to go into hotel quarantine, most of them."<\/p>\n Groth also declared that since every player took to the court during the Melbourne Summer series prior to the Australian Open, the "opportunity to play" and warm-up was ultimately undertaken by each competitor.<\/p>\n "We've had the quarantine period but you've got to remember, when we come into an Australian Open normally, players have had only one or two weeks of tournament play," he said.<\/p>\n "While it's been built up to be this big thing, players have all had the opportunity to play in that lead-up week.<\/p>\n "The Melbourne summer series was huge. I don't think it's as much as a factor as people are making it out to be."<\/p>\n And it appears the comments made by Groth could be spot on after 69th-ranked American Ann Li defeated No.31 seed Zhang, 6-2 6-0.<\/p>\n Li was coming off an unusual accomplishment at a tune-up tournament at Melbourne Park last week: She shared the title of the Grampians Trophy with Anett Kontaveit because organisers decided not to hold a final so as not to wear out the players right before the Australian Open.<\/p>\n That warm-up event was created for players such as Li who had to go into a hard lockdown after potentially being exposed to COVID-19. They were not allowed out of their hotel rooms for practice \u2014 or any other reason \u2014 during a two-week quarantine upon arrival in Australia.<\/p>\n – with AP<\/em><\/p>\n For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Former Aussie player Sam Groth has hit back at tennis stars claiming their two-week hotel quarantine period affected their opening round Australian Open performances. Frenchman […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32944"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32944"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32946,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32944\/revisions\/32946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
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