After the disappointment that for him meant not being able to travel to Australia on time, he seemed to be on the Melbourne bubble tour, which will culminate in the Australian Open (February 8-21), Andy Murray has started planning otherwise the season, so as not to be stopped until the end of next month.
Therefore, the Scotsman, who tested positive for COVID just the day he was going to travel to the oceanic country and did not find a viable solution to pass the mandatory 14-day quarantine before the start of competition, He has signed up for an ATP Challenger in Biella (Italy), as confirmed by the Italian Tennis Federation. There, at the I Faggi Sport Wellness & Friends club, he will compete from February 15 to 21 in this tournament that will be played on hard court and won by Argentinean Facundo Bagnis last year. The team is of 32 tennis players and this year it will have two consecutive editions (the first from 8 to 14).
The Spanish Alejandro Davidovich will also be in the transalpine event, who also tested positive along with his coach earlier this month and decided not to go to Australia to recover well and face the rest of the season in good condition. The Malaga player has not played a Challenger since October 2019, when he won the one from Liuzhou (China), by beating Uzbek Denis Istomin in the final. They will also be the American Sebastian Korda, finalist a few days ago in the ATP 250 in Antalya, and the Italians Andreas Seppi and Lorenzo Musetti.
He played a Challenger in Mallorca
It is not the first time that Murray uses second-rate to finalize his preparation. In September 2019 he participated in the one in Mallorca, which was held at the Rafa Nadal Academy in Manacor, at the invitation of a Balearic tennis player. The Briton, out of shape, fell in the second round against Italian Matteo Viola. At that time, Murray had not played a Challenger for almost 14 years.