Australian
Open chief Craig Tiley on Saturday confirmed all players must be vaccinated against
COVID-19 in order to participate in the upcoming edition of the Grand Slam next
January.

This comes with
World No 1 and defending champion Novak Djokovic refusing to confirm whether he
is vaccinated or not, saying he will wait for Tennis Australia to announce
their health protocols before deciding whether he will play in Melbourne or
not.

“There’s a
lot of speculation about vaccination and just to be really clear, when the
[state] premier announced that everyone on site … will need to be vaccinated
… we made that clear to the playing group,” The Guardian quoted Tiley saying during
an interaction with reporters.

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“(Novak)
has said that he views this as a private matter for him. We would love to see
Novak here, he knows that he’ll have to be vaccinated to play here.”

The
announcement brings an end to long-drawn negotiations between Tennis Australia and
the Victoria state government, which has insisted that everyone at Melbourne
Park needs to be vaccinated.

Prime
Minister Scott Morrison had earlier said that unvaccinated players will be
allowed into the country if they served a 14-day quarantine period and if the
state of Victoria applied for an exemption. However, Victoria Premier Daniel
Andrews confirmed that the state will not seek any exemptions for unvaccinated
players.

Djokovic,
who is tied with Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer on a record 20 singles Grand
Slam titles, will have the chance to become the all-time leader in that regard with
a record-extending 10th Australian Open crown if he decides to play.

Nadal has
confirmed he will play in Melbourne next January but Federer, who is also not vaccinated,
will miss out as he recovers from a knee surgery.  

Meanwhile,
Tiley confirmed 80% of all players are vaccinated and that they will play in
front of capacity crowds in all stadiums when the tournament begins on January
17.