UPDATE: Crowds have since been increased to 80 per cent capacity.

Neil Mitchell is calling on the Victorian government to allow full crowds to attend the Australian Open finals featuring Aussies.

When crowd capacity was scaled back to 50 per cent in the week prior to the tournament, sessions already sold past that threshold were not scaled back.

But Neil Mitchell has been told, due to many people pulling out as a result of COVID-19 and travel complications, the number currently sold is “not much more than 50 per cent”.

Yesterday, crowd caps were boosted to 65 per cent, but the 3AW Mornings presenter says “with Barty and the doubles final being two Australian teams, you would guarantee 100 per cent attendance if you had the tickets available”.

Rod Laver Arena has a capacity of 14,820, and there was a crowd of 27,740 at the Australia v Vietnam soccer match last night.

Neil Mitchell is urging the Premier to do all he can to boost crowd capacity at the tennis.

“I’ve got a plea here to the Premier: Ash Barty and the two Australian doubles teams deserve a full crowd. Premier, is there any good reason why you can’t change the rules and let them have a full crowds?,” he said.

“Let’s give this a go. I mean, we need this!”

Chair of epidemiology at Deakin University, Professor Catherine Bennett, says a full crowd could attend Rod Laver Arena relatively safely.

She says air circulation at the venue was probably better when the roof was closed last night than it was when it was partially open.

“They’ve upgraded their air filtration and their ventilation for this tournament specifically and there was actually a good bit of movement,” Professor Bennett told Neil Mitchell.

“It is quite well managed, the way people move around there.

“It’s not zero risk, nothing is at the moment, but the difference between full capacity and 75 per cent capacity is probably not going to make a massive difference.”

Press PLAY below to hear Neil’s plea 

Press PLAY below to hear Professor Bennett’s view on full crowds at the tennis

Image: Andy Cheung/Getty Images