Does tennis really want eccentric Djokovic as face of the sport?

World No 1 divides opinion with those bizarre pseudo science pronouncements

AMONG the highlights in the long-running comic soap opera of Athletes In Lockdown was when Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray had a two-way chat via Instagram.

Fans were asked to send in questions and one enquired what the first thing is that the two men do when they get up each day.

Djokovic, keen to make a good impression, responded earnestly: ‘Gratitude and prayer, a couple of long deep breaths, hugging my wife and running to my children.’

Murray, trying to supress a chuckle, then gave his deadpan answer, ‘I go for a pee’.

In this exchange last month the Scot was adhering to what has emerged as best practice for these occasions: keep it simple, keep it light. Murray will end up with far fewer major titles, but when it comes to self-awareness he comes across as a Grand Slam champion to Djokovic’s struggling journeyman.

Across sport the question is increasingly asked, ‘Who has had a good lockdown?’. In the case of Djokovic, he has lurched from one public relations disaster to another, most notably in his jaw-dropping Instagram chats with American nutrition entrepreneur Chervin Jafarieh, who finally appeared to have been stood down last week. Like everyone else, the world No 1

will sorely wish that he was inhabiting the parallel universe that today would have seen the climax to the clay-court season begin, the Sunday start of the French Open.

Business as usual these last few weeks would have meant trawling through Monte Carlo, Madrid and Rome. There would have been none of the controversy stoked up by his public extolling of ideas that could best be described as left-field.

Djokovic would have been doing what he does best, playing his metronomically efficient tennis in the epic contest to see which man will end up being crowned the greatest ever. This fortnight we would be speculating about his chances of usurping not just the king of Roland Garros, Rafael Nadal, but also Austria’s Dominic Thiem, now a credible challenger.

No trio of male players will have had as much to lose by the abandonment of the clay season.

It is noteworthy that, during the weeks of boredom, all three have had awkward moments via various forms of media.

Nadal has taken some heat in Spain for comments on his government’s handling of the crisis, while Thiem has raised the ire of lowerranked players by declining to get involved with relief fund projects designed to support them.

Yet neither have suffered the self-inflicted blows to their reputation as sustained by their Serbian rival.

Less popular already than his widely-adored peers Nadal and Roger Federer, you wonder what kind of reception he will receive when international tennis finally gets to resume.

It did not have to be like this, especially as Djokovic has been very generous in contributing to efforts to fight coronavirus.

Not only has he given one million euros to help buy such things as ventilators in his homeland, he gave a similar amount to the locality of Lombardy in Italy, which has been so badly hit.

The problem is that this can easily be overlooked, due to his escapades on social media. Or as some in the game have come to call it, Crank TV.

For the lockdown has shone a light on some of Djokovic’s stranger beliefs which have developed over the past 10 years, underpinned by a mistrust of conventional medicine. These have a particular focus on diet, and an apparent inclination towards conspiracy theories.

They have mushroomed since he began to take a deep interest in what he was eating, following stamina issues earlier in his career.

He cut out wheat from his diet after going through an exercise that involved holding a slice of bread to his stomach.

More recently he was distraught at undergoing conventional surgery on his elbow when natural methods had failed. There was also his association with Spanish coach Pepe Imaz, who promotes a ‘peace and love’ spiritual dimension to his training methods. Imaz was dumped in 2018 after Djokovic’s results suffered.

On April 20 he took part in a Facebook chat with other Serbian athletes in which he revealed himself as an ‘anti-vaxxer’, in response to suggestions that ATP players might have to take a protective shot, should one become available.

‘Personally, I am opposed to a vaccination and I wouldn’t want to be forced by someone to take a vaccine in order to be able to travel. But if it becomes compulsory, what will happen?’ he asked.

This prompted a slapdown from leading Serbian government epidemiologist Predrag Kon, who asked him to desist from using his national hero status to publicise such views.

By then Djokovic’s wife, Jelena, had received a ‘False information badge’ from Instagram for sharing a video promoting 5G conspiracy theories in relation to the virus.

There was more embarrassment on May 5, when he posted a video of himself practising at his Spanish base, before the government there had eased restrictions on tennis. In fairness, he was given misleading guidance by the club involved, and Nadal fell foul of a similar misunderstanding.

Most damaging of all has been the world No1’s association with close friend and self-styled wellness guru Jafarieh, with whom he has been enthusiastically participating in Instagram chats they labelled ‘The Self Mastery Project’.

Some of the pseudoscientific ideas they share go beyond the eccentric, and might be considered flat out dangerous.

One central theme is the supposed power of the mind over the nutritional value of food. An extreme example comes when they advance the theory that thinking positive thoughts can cleanse toxic drinking water.

The healing power of trampolines has been discussed. Arguably the most cringeworthy part is where Jafarieh starts flogging the wares, infomercial-style, of his Cymbiotika enterprise. At one point Djokovic reveals he uses one of Jafareih’s ‘coated silver’ supplements, which cost nearly £100 for 50ml.

The player’s 33rd birthday came and went last week and he is unlikely to return with his popularity enhanced, whenever it is that the tour resumes. It could be a blessing that it may yet be sufficiently far into the future for fans to have forgotten his sequence of lockdown mishaps.

Extolled ideas in public that may best be considered as left-field