Coronavirus impact: Five players ruled out of French Open qualifying
Two players in the qualifying rounds for the French Open have tested positive for the coronavirus, the French Tennis Federation said late Sunday, while three others have been in close contact with a coach who also tested positive.
The FFT said in a statement that all five players will isolate for a period of seven days, and none of them will participate in the qualifiers starting Monday for the Sept. 27-Oct. 11 tournament.
Organizers did not name any of the players or the coach concerned, but the website of sports daily L’Équipe named the coach as Petar Popovic and one of the players as 114th-ranked Damir Dzumhur.
The FFT added that around 900 coronavirus tests have been carried out since Thursday ahead of the clay-court tournament in western Paris.
Earlier, US Open champion Naomi Osaka has pulled out of the French Open because of an injured left hamstring.
Osaka joins defending champion Ash Barty in skipping the French Open, which opens on Sept. 27 in Paris.
In another blow to the clay Grand Slam, tournament organizers announced a further reduction in crowd sizes, because of France's worsening coronavirus epidemic.
The new limit, decreed by the Paris police department, is 5,000 spectators per day, organizers said in a statement late Thursday. They'd previously been planning for 11,500 spectators, split among three sites at Roland Garros.
