Djokovic warned to follow the rules

IT has been like watching a never-ending rally between Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic which just goes on and on, from side to side, ebbing and flowing.

And just when you think one has the upper hand, the other pulls out something unexpected and the rally goes back to the start again. Side to side. Back and forth.

That‘s exactly what trying to keep up with the political fall-out surrounding whether unvaccinated players (ie Djokovic) can play in January’s Australian Open has been like.

There has been Tennis Australia desperately trying to find a way for months to sneak the world No.1 in so he can break the grand slam record at his favourite tournament.

Then there is the Victorian Government who have smelt a long way out that such a move doesn‘t pass the pub test.

And lastly we have the Federal Government who have once again shown brilliantly how one hand clearly doesn‘t know what the other is doing.

Last week Immigration Minister Alex Hawke seemed to be very clear that every visitor to Australia needed to be double vaccinated.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews kept his no-jab noplay line but then his Sports Minister Martin Pakula offered that the issue was “not settled yet”. Confused?

On Wednesday Prime Minister Scott Morrison got involved, declaring unvaccinated tennis players could come in under an exemption, like other necessary workers, as long as they did the two-weeks hotel quarantine.

The kicker here was that the states could hand out these exemptions.

Thankfully Andrews finally brought some clarity to the Djokovic vaccination debate.

“Victoria will not be applying for any exemptions for unvaccinated players,” he said.

Novak, you have just over two months to get vaccinated.