Enlarge image
Tennis superstar Novak Djokovic
Photo: RUNGROJ YONGRIT / EPA
In his long tennis career, Novak Djokovic has often looked for alternatives to classical medicine that were right for him - long before the corona pandemic.
With the early, very radical and not feasible for everyone switch to a gluten-free diet, he was right for himself personally.
It is guaranteed that in 2017 and 2018, despite acute pain on his injured elbow and against the advice of his doctors and his team, he initially refrained from a classic operation.
It was only when the alternative healing powers of the questionable mental guru Pepe Imaz did not produce the desired progress that the 20-time Grand Slam champion corrected his mistake and thus saved his athletic career.
Shortly after the pandemic began in spring 2020, criticism quickly grew louder from many quarters when the Serb wanted to make his almost ten million followers on Instagram aware during a live video that toxic water could be converted into drinking water.
Vaccination status always left open
There sat the best tennis player in the world with his friend, the self-proclaimed alchemist Chervin Jafarieh, and said: »I know some people who, through energetic transformations, through the power of prayer, through the power of gratitude, the most poisonous food, or perhaps the most poisonous Have transformed water into the water with the greatest healing power. "
It should therefore come as no surprise a year later that number one in the world rankings initially left his vaccination status open - with reference to freedom of expression, as he last said publicly on the sidelines of the ATP finals in November.
Since Tuesday, it's almost clear: Novak Djokovic is almost certainly not vaccinated.
Because he starts with an exception at the Australian Open.
"Rigorous testing process"
The 34-year-old announced this on Instagram himself and first. At the first high point of the young tennis season, only doubly vaccinated athletes are allowed to enter the country. Those in charge of the tournament from the Australian Tennis Association reacted immediately and said that Djokovic's request for a medical exemption had been approved after a "rigorous review process" by two independent panels of medical experts.
The people of Australia experienced one of the toughest lockdowns in the world;
the vaccination rate is around 90 percent.
Booster vaccinations have only just started.
More than 14,000 new cases were recorded in the state of Victoria on Tuesday alone.
A serial winner who is actually popular Down Under but has not been vaccinated doesn’t really fit the mood.
The Australian daily newspaper "The Courier Mail" headlined on Wednesday: "You must be Djoking".
Djokovic is not alone.
Tournament director Craig Tiley spoke in the Australian media of "a handful" of unvaccinated players with an approved exemption.
This is stricter for players than for other guests.
Two medical panels, one set up by Tennis Australia and one by the government, blindly examine the applications - without knowing who the application came from.
Actors, however, have to prove an acute medical condition, which is difficult to imagine as a top athlete.
An illness with the virus after the first of August can also be a reason.
The two-time quarter-finalist Tennys Sandgren waived an unvaccinated application because the criteria did not apply to him, as he revealed to an American reporter.
The French double specialist Pierre-Hugues Herbert canceled weeks ago.
According to the ATP, 95 players in the top 100 are vaccinated.
Memory of the Adriatic Tour
Despite a few exceptions, everything is now focused on Djokovic.
The Serb already experienced the excitement after the Adriatic Tour in 2020.
At that time, as a co-organizer, he adhered to state rules;
was criticized internationally after several corona cases (including himself), which spread to the locals in the Balkan countries, but for conditions that were far too lax.
One must credit the best tennis player of this time that he has at least long ended his professional relationship with Imaz, who pushed him into a publicly critically eyed esoteric corner and since the Instagram excursion about healing water in the further course of the pandemic, no statements against the fight against them Pandemic recognized science has made.
Djokovic invoked his privacy on his own vaccination status and thus exercised no public influence in his Serbian homeland, where he is considered the greatest individual athlete of all time.
The numerous large donations that he gives in his home country are often lost in the western world because of his medical views.
It will now be less about his outstanding sporting achievements and more about this exception for a long time.
At the same time, a video of Rafael Nadal appeared on social media on Tuesday, wearing a mask in Melbourne, apologizing after training that he was not allowed to sign autographs due to the conditions.
The race for the most likeable of the best players in the world is decided outside of the tennis courts.
