I knew Novak Djokovic would win his seventh Wimbledon title. As a Djokovic fan, this one is all the sweeter given the strange, Nole year he’s having.
In January, the anti-Covid vaxer was given an exemption to play the Australian Open, then detained after arriving in Australia , then told he could play, then deported. I myself am vaccinated and twice boosted. I support a country’s right to make its own protocols. But the way Djokovic was treated was an absolute disgrace. What was the point of the Australian Open giving him an exemption knowing full well the government would probably not admit him?. If you think Djokovic i— a man whose finely tuned body has taken him to tennis immortality — is selfish for not getting vaccinated, so be it. Me, I would go along to get along, just to make sure Rafael Nadal didn’t have more Slam titles than I did. Still, the way Djokovic was treated was just plain cruel.
The truth is while vaccination is important to mitigate the spread and seriousness of the virus, it’s not going to stop players or anyone else from getting it. Why not test and mask all the players for the run of a tournament? Are officials requiring vaccination cards of all the fans at every tournament?
I’ve seen small offices where the staff isn’t even informed that a colleague is out with Covid. The truth is that after two years, convenience now trumps precautions. I think tournaments and countries like the US Open and the United States can still take precautions and let unvaccinated players like Novak Djokovic play, given that tennis is a naturally socially distant sport.
Adding to the craziness, he gained no rankings points for winning Wimbledon— he’s dropped from No. 1 to No. 7 — because the Association of Tennis Professionals didn’t award any points since Russian and Belarusian athletes were barred because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. So everyone else has to suffer. Really.
And yet despite all this, Djokovic is only one Slam behind Nadal, who was conveniently injured at Wimbledon, grass being hard on his knees and thus his worst surface. Among the records he has set this year, Djokovic has been No. 1 for 373 weeks and is the only player to win more than 80 singles matches at the four Slams. Whatever happens from hereon in, his legacy as one of the greatest players ever is assured.
Whereas the jury is still out on world leaders’ handling of Covid.