MELBOURNE, Australia -- Former Australian Open champion Angelique Kerber admits she would likely have thought twice about traveling to Melbourne for the first Grand Slam of the year had she known what was to be in store upon her arrival.
Kerber was one of 72 international players who were forced to endure a fortnight of hotel quarantine in Melbourne following a series of positive COVID-19 tests on international arrival aircrafts, meaning she missed out on vital practice ahead of the tournament.
On opening day at Melbourne Park, the German slumped to a 6-0, 6-4 loss to unseeded American Bernarda Pera for her earliest exit in the tournament since 2015 and questioned whether she should have stayed home.
"If I knew the real situation before my trip, I would maybe think twice to come here," Kerber said after her match. "I was not planning the two weeks' hard quarantine.
"I don't know, maybe if I knew that before, to stay two weeks' in the hard quarantine without hitting a ball, maybe I would think twice [about coming].
"I was not feeling the rhythm that I was before the two weeks, to be honest. I was really trying to stay positive, but you feel it, especially if you play the first match in a Grand Slam against an opponent who doesn't stay in the hard lockdown.
"But I was trying to take the motivation for this tournament because it's one of my favorite tournaments. I knew that we play with a little bit of fans, which makes tennis playing much more fun. So that was my motivation."
Despite the comments, Kerber also praised Australia for the work done in recent months to contain the spread of COVID-19 and allow for the tournament to take place in a relatively familiar environment.
Australia has only 53 active cases of the coronavirus in Australia.
"Australia is doing a really good job," she said. "Now, when you are free, you go outside, everything is open. It feels like a normal life."