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Post by Admin on Jun 23, 2020 19:00:56 GMT
Top-ranked tennis player Novak Djokovic announced Tuesday that he and his wife have COVID-19 after he played in a series of exhibition matches he organized in Serbia and Croatia with zero social distancing amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Djokovic -- who is third in the history of men's tennis with 17 Grand Slam titles -- is the fourth player to test positive for the illness after participating in the matches held in Belgrade and Zadar, Croatia.
The others were three-time Grand Slam semifinalist Grigor Dimitrov, Borna Coric and Viktor Troicki.
"Unfortunately, this virus is still present, and it is a new reality that we are still learning to cope and live with. I am hoping things will ease with time so we can all resume lives the way they were," Djokovic said in a statement released Tuesday. "I am extremely sorry for each individual case of infection. I hope that it will not complicate anyone's health situation and that everyone will be fine."
Djokovic has been in the news frequently in connection to the COVID-19 outbreak, which led to the suspension of the ATP and WTA professional tennis tours in March. Plans were announced last week for the sport's sanctioned events to return in August.
In April, he was criticized for saying he would not want to take a vaccine for the virus in order to be able to compete, even if it were mandatory for travel.
In May, when he was staying in Spain, Djokovic broke local lockdown rules by practicing at a tennis club about a week before it was allowed.
More recently, Djokovic complained about the U.S. Tennis Association's plans to try to protect people from the virus during the US Open with such measures as limiting the size of players' entourages. He went so far as to say he didn't know whether he would go to the tournament in New York.
The US Open is scheduled to begin Aug. 31 without spectators, and the French Open -- postponed from May -- is supposed to start Sept. 27.
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Post by Admin on Jun 24, 2020 19:11:05 GMT
Djokovic’s latest vision was the Adria Tour, a charity exhibition series that was scheduled to be played in four Balkan cities over four weekends. Djokovic saw it as a chance to showcase his home city of Belgrade to the tennis world. The night before the first leg of the tour, he posted a picture of himself arm in arm with two other Adria stars, Dominic Thiem and Alexander Zverev, on a Belgrade street. “Grateful to welcome my friends to my city,” a beaming Djokovic wrote. “Feels good to have an opportunity to show them where I come from, the beauty of this place and our people.” Djokovic and the Adria organizers also saw a chance to do something no one else had tried: To bring tennis back just as we remembered it. Neither Serbia nor Croatia, the first two countries on the Adria Tour, had been hit hard by COVID-19. As Djokovic would later say, he and others involved in staging the event believed the virus had “weakened.” So they played with none of the usual coronavirus restrictions. In Belgrade, fans jammed the seats, players shook hands and hugged, and ball kids fetched towels for them. The sight was thrilling and alarming in equal measure. The fact that Djokovic and his wife and the other players then went dancing—indoors, with no social distancing—was simply alarming. And that’s when Djokovic came up against a very hard limit, one that he couldn’t visualize his way past. He, his wife, Jelena, and half a dozen other people involved in the Adria Tour—including Grigor Dimitrov, Borna Coric, and Viktor Troicki and his pregnant wife—have tested positive for COVID-19. “Unfortunately, the virus is still present,” Djokovic said in a statement on Tuesday, “and it is a new reality that we are still learning to cope and live with…I am sorry for each individual case of infection. I hope that it will not complicate anyone’s health situation, and that everyone will be fine.” Not surprisingly, Djokovic is being pilloried in the press and censured by his fellow players. Barstool Sports called him the “village idiot,” and Nick Kyrgios described the Adria Tour as “boneheaded.” There are rumors that the ATP Player Council may move to oust him as its president. Many will see his infection as a comeuppance, and you can understand why. This spring, Djokovic earned corona-related criticism for (1) wavering on whether he would take a vaccine for it; (2) breaking lockdown rules to practice at a club in Spain; (3) describing the US Open’s original entourage restrictions as “extreme,” and (4) traveling back to Serbia before being tested on Monday. During their talk, Djokovic asserted, among other things, that “Scientists have proven that molecules in the water react to our emotions,” and “Through the power of prayer, through the power of gratitude, [people] manage to turn the most toxic food or the most polluted water into the most healing water.” Some will wonder if Djokovic thought he could ward off the virus with positive emotion. But as much as he believes in the power of visualization and the mind, he also knows that tennis requires actual physical preparation, too. Few players have been as meticulous about nutrition and training as Djokovic, who is gluten-free and observes a plant-based diet. It’s hard to believe that someone who is so careful about what he puts in his body could be so cavalier about contracting a virus. And yet he was. Djokovic didn’t force any of the other players to join the Adria Tour. He wasn’t the only person involved in the decision to stage it without COVID-19 restrictions. And we don’t know how the infections started. But he has earned the criticism he has received, because he was the ringmaster of the show, and because he’s a leader in men’s tennis. Djokovic’s positive test, and those of his wife and fellow players, are a lesson for everyone, not just for the tennis world—about reopening too quickly, about flouting science, about trusting in the wellness movement and power of positive thinking, and, most importantly, about the continuing danger of the coronavirus. What makes it worse to me is how happy and proud Djokovic was to bring tennis to Belgrade. He beamed when Thiem and Zverev joined him for dinner there, and he cried when the weekend was over and his childhood memories of the city flooded back. Djokovic’s critics say he “wants to be loved”; in this case, he wanted his home to be loved. But it was the wrong time to try to live without limits.
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Post by Admin on Jun 25, 2020 2:18:03 GMT
Novak Djokovic's parents defended their son on Wednesday and blamed another tennis player for spreading the coronavirus at a series of exhibition matches hosted by the top-ranked player. Djokovic and his wife tested positive for the virus on Tuesday. The 17-time Grand Slam champion apologized online for organizing the Adria Tour events, which brought together professional players from various countries to play matches in Serbia and Croatia. Thousands of spectators attended the matches, and no social distancing was observed. Djokovic's father blamed the cancellation of the tour on Grigor Dimitrov, one of three other players to test positive in the past few days. There is no evidence to suggest Dimitrov spread the virus to others. "Why did it happen? Because that man probably came sick, who knows from where," Srdjan Djokovic told RTL Croatia TV. "He didn't test here. He tested somewhere else. ... I think that's not fair. "He inflicted damage to both Croatia and to us as a family in Serbia. Nobody is feeling well because of this situation." Dimitrov, a three-time Grand Slam semifinalist from Bulgaria, was the first Adria Tour participant to test positive for the virus. He was followed by Borna Coric and Viktor Troicki. "We were wrong, and it was too soon," wrote Djokovic, who had previously said he was opposed to vaccination and might not take a vaccine for the virus even if it became mandatory to travel.
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Post by Admin on Jun 25, 2020 20:31:26 GMT
In a recent Instagram post, Austrian Dominic Thiem talked about his reaction when he heard about the COVID-19 cases and how he and the other tennis players made a mistake. He said, “I was shocked when I got the news from the Adria Tour. We played without an audience for weeks so we have been more than happy about the fans at the event. We trusted the Serbian Government’s rules but we have been too optimistic. Our behaviour was a mistake, we acted too euphorically. I am extremely sorry.” http://instagram.com/p/CB2bvHBlA_f Since the Austrian was in contact with people who were infected with the virus, he needed to get tested to see whether he was also infected. In the same post, he gave some good news as he said, http://instagram.com/p/CBdppYel6Bg “I’ve now gotten tested five times within the last 10 days and the result was always negative. I wish everyone who has been infected all the best and a quick recovery.”
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Post by Admin on Jun 26, 2020 19:13:13 GMT
Srdjan Djokovic, Novak Djokovic's father, claims Dimitrov infected the Tour—a charge Dimitrov's agent denies. "How did the infection come about? Probably because Dimitrov came sick, who knows where,” Srdjan Djokovic told Croatian television network RTL. “He was not tested in Zadar, but somewhere else. I don’t think that’s right. "I think it is not correct that the test was not done here, but somewhere else... "[He has caused] great harm to you in Croatia, to us as a family and to Serbia. Nobody is well, not even my son." Novak Djokovic, Borna Coric, Dimitrov and Viktor Troicki, who all played the Adria Tour, have all tested positive for coronavirus and are self-isolating. In an Instagram post, Kyrgios shot down Djokovic senior's attempt to make Dimitrov the fall guy posting this response.
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