The Australian Open Men’s Final will be kicking off at 7.30pm tonight, however, it’s not yet known if Novak Djokovic‘s father, Srdjan Djokovic, will be in the stands to watch his son compete for the trophy against Stefanos Tsitsipas.
As reported by news.com.au, Australian Open boss Craig Tiley hadn’t made a decision on whether Srdjan would be penalised by Tennis Australia for posing with men who appeared to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
On Wednesday night, Srdjan posed for a photo with a man holding a Russian flag with Vladamir Putin‘s face on it while outside Rod Laver Arena. Ukraine’s ambassador to Australia, Vasyl Myroshnychenko, called for Tennis Australia to act accordingly to condemn the war as a result.
When Craig was asked if it was a “good look” for Srdjan to be at the grand final after the event which transpired, he said it was still “too early to tell.”
“We’ve spoken to the family. They’ve been brilliant in the whole situation,” Craig explained.
“They feel devastated by the fact it has been reviewed this way and I know very much so his dad and the family, they want peace, they don’t want war, they’ve made that clear.”
“They feel really bad they got into this unfortunate situation.”
This morning, Craig said that Srdjan hadn’t breached the event policy.
“There are individuals that come on site with a purposeful intent to disrupt the enjoyment of other fans,” Craig told Nine.
“Those individuals will be removed. Certainly Novak’s dad was not in that position of doing that.”
“It was one of those situations where he was around people that were enjoying it and one or two individuals in that crowd that shouldn’t have been here on site.”
Srdjan opted out of watching Novak’s Semi Final against American tennis player Tommy Paul where his son won in straight sets.
“I hope he is going to be feeling OK to be in the courts because I would like to have him there,” Novak said of his upcoming final in a press conference. He also addressed the situation with the photo, saying it has been interpreted in “a really wrong way”.
Novak will compete against Stefanos on Rod Laver at 7.30pm, which is sadly at the same time as The Bachelors finale (lol), but will likely go into five sets given the history of Men’s Single Finals.
If Novak defeats the Greek 24-year-old, he’ll be on par with Rafael Nadal‘s all-time record of 22 Grand Slam titles.
