The outbreak of the coronavirus has put everything in chaos. While many sporting events have hit a halt, many have postponed their dates.
Amidst all this, the French Open - which was scheduled for get underway from May 24 - has been rescheduled to start from September 20 as the country is under lockdown.
With the change in date, the new itinerary will see the French Open - which is played on a clay court - start just a week after US Open - which is played on hard court - and also overlap with the Laver Cup.
The decision for the same was announced via social media and it came as a surprise to several players as they were not being consulted over the change. Indian tennis ace Sania Mirza also spoke about the issues the change in date will cause.
“I just think that there’s a lot going (on) in the world right now and everybody has their hands full,” Sania told ESPN.in. “Sure, the players should have been informed. I did get an email from the federation but I was asleep then. Once I was up, I saw the email and then the tweet and spoke to a couple of players and they were obviously very irritated because they first found out about it on Twitter.”
“I’m not sure how the French Open is going to fit into the schedule. Hopefully, things blow over and we should be able to play the US swing. But I don’t know how we are going to suddenly play a clay tournament one week after the hard court season,” she added.
As for Sania, she had flown to the US for the now-cancelled Indian Wells along with her father. However, an hour after they had reached California, the decision to call off the tournament was announced.
“I’d finished Fed Cup on Saturday and together with my dad, we left for Indian Wells soon after. An hour after we reached California on Sunday evening, players got an email saying the tournament was cancelled. So I had travelled 20 hours basically for nothing,” the 33-year-old said.
Sania had also made her professional comeback this year and had said she was ‘freaked out’.
“Everybody was in a bit of shock on Monday. No one knew what to do. I freaked out. I was also confused about what was going on. In hindsight, it was the right call. There was just so much uncertainty. Nobody really knew the magnitude of what was happening. Maybe the timing could have been better,” she said.
