Tennis Australia’s chief executive Craig Tiley reckons that tall toddler Novak Djokovic will compete at the Australian Open in 2023 despite the fact the federal government slapped him with a three-year ban on re-entering the country.
Tiley claimed on the ABC (via the Guardian) on Sunday that the numero uno tennis player will be back in the country less than 365 days after he lost his legal battle against the federal government and was booted out of here.
“Obviously I think he’s got to play out this year but that will be his intention,” Tiley said.
“At the end of the day he’s the number one player in the world and he loves The Australian Open.”
Yeah but he’s also an anti-vaxxer who was found by the court to have lied to the federal government about catching COVID. Don’t know whether that completely overrules that one, bro.
In case you missed it, Djokovic had his visa canceled and copped a three-year ban on re-entering Australia. He can only return within those three years in a compelling circumstance and something tells me that “I wanna pway tennis grr” isn’t one.
The Tennis Australia representative also denied claims that Djokovic planned to sue the institution for the controversy. He did not respond to reports that Djokovic planned to sue the Australian government.
“No. I mean there is going to be lots of reports on different things but we are in a position where we are focused on delivering an event right now and we will continue to deliver a great event.”
In case you missed it Immigration Minister Alex Hawke used his personal power to cancel Djokovic’s visa. The tennis player’s lawyers then filed an immediate injunction against the decision but it was dismissed unanimously between the three Federal Court judges.
Djokovic dropped a Notes app statement on Instagram a few days prior to the legal battle conclusion regarding his infamous clash with the Australian Border Force, and whether or not he knowingly went to events with COVID-19 (spoilers, he did).
“I want to address the continuing misinformation about my activities and attendance at events in December in the lead up to my positive PCR COVID test result,” the vaxless racket-swinger wrote.
“I attended a basketball game in Belgrade on 14 December, after which it was reported that a number of people tested positive with COVID 19.”
