Dubbo Sportsworld manager Greg King has concerns about the future of his centre and the hundreds of people in the city who use it after he was forced to close the doors on Monday amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
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Indoor sport centres were one of the non-essential services forced to close from 12pm on Monday along with gyms, pubs, clubs, cinemas and places of worship following new measures introduced by Prime Minster Scott Morrison on Sunday night.
While understanding why the decision had been made amid concerns about the virus spreading, King said he was left a little disappointed by its sudden nature given he had already made a raft of changes to way things had operated at Sportsworld in recent weeks.
"It's not something we had the opportunity to plan for," King said.
"We were under taking a plan and changed lots of things in the centre to supply a service in a limited capacity.
"In those guidelines we were easily under the 100 people mark and the one person in each one by four metre area.
"It's disappointing for people because recreational sport is not only about physical activity. It's a mental thing and a social night out with friends where you can have fun and it's now gone."
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King had been somewhat ahead of the game as competition had been postponed from last week as planning was done in order to make the centre safe and able to deliver its services moving forward.
While the various indoor sporting competitions - which currently feature more than 150 teams across each week and mainly officiated by casual employees - were on hold the indoor cricket and basketball courts, as well as other facilities like Inflatable World, bubble soccer, and laser skirmish were still going to available for hire.
"There's not just restrictions on them, it's a complete lockdown. A few people can'y even just go and shoot baskets," King said.
"Sport and recreation plays a major role in society."
If the forced closure does continue for another six months, something the Prime Minster said was a real possibility on Sunday night, Sportsworld's future would be in doubt due to the lack of income and costs involved in maintaining a facility of its size.
"How many businesses have a facility this size? We could have to survive for six months with no income," King said.
"We've got no mail orders or online services so if we went six months with no income it would be serious trouble."
Despite his disappointment in the sudden nature of the decision and the impact it can have, King said the health and well-being of the community had to come first.
It was something he had worked on in recent weeks at the centre as hand sanitiser had been readily available, social distancing had been enforced, players were required to use their own equipment rather than hire things like indoor cricket gloves, regular washing of equipment had been undertaken and there were no hand shakes after games.
"On the other hand, we certainly don't want anything to do with something that could cause a fatality in a family," King said.
"But you look at the measures we had in place and we were making things safer for people than it would be in a supermarket.
"But it's an Australia-wide problem so it's a big of a negative the way it's been done but it's a problem I'd hate to try and solve."