By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Sunday January 16, 2022
Does Rafael Nadal believe that Novak Djokovic should be playing at the Australian Open this year? It is a question that is being put to many players in press conferences on Day 1 – and rightfully so. Nadal himself admitted that he is ready to move on from the subject, but still did take time to speak his piece.
“Almost one week ago when he won in the first instance, the case, he was able to get back his visa and practicing,” Nadal said. “I said the justice has spoken. If the justice says his visa is valid and he's able to play here, the justice has spoken, so that's the fairest thing, that he deserve to play here.”
Nadal continued, stressing that he is in no position to argue with the judgment handed down by the Australian authorities.
“Yesterday the justice said another thing. I will never be again against what the justice says.”
Finally the Spaniard said that in a perfect world all the best players would be there to compete in the biggest tournaments.
“Another thing is what I believe personally and what I believe is the ideal situation personally, no?” he said. “The ideal situation in the world of sport, that the best players are on court and playing the most important events without a doubt. That's better for the sport without a doubt. If Novak Djokovic is playing here, is better for everybody, no doubt about that."
Nadal says he gets along great with Djokovic and says that it's a difficult situation to make sense out of.
"I think the situation have been a mess," he said. "He's not the only one that did probably the things bad in that case. Of course, there is more responsibles on all this terrible situation that we faced for the last two weeks. But of course he is one of the responsibles, too. So in a personal level, yes, I would like to see him playing here. If is fair or not that he's playing here is another discussion that I don't want to talk anymore about that.
“I can't say another thing because I believe that the situation is very clear now.”