Australian Open Chief Tells Djokovic Family: 'Be Really Careful'

Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 21, 2023 Serbia's Novak Djokovic shakes hands with Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov after winning his third round match REUTERS/Loren Elliott
Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 21, 2023 Serbia's Novak Djokovic shakes hands with Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov after winning his third round match REUTERS/Loren Elliott
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Australian Open Chief Tells Djokovic Family: 'Be Really Careful'

Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 21, 2023 Serbia's Novak Djokovic shakes hands with Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov after winning his third round match REUTERS/Loren Elliott
Tennis - Australian Open - Melbourne Park, Melbourne, Australia - January 21, 2023 Serbia's Novak Djokovic shakes hands with Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov after winning his third round match REUTERS/Loren Elliott

Australian Open chief Craig Tiley on Saturday advised Novak Djokovic's family to be "really careful" of people using the tournament's global exposure as a platform for "disruptive" purposes.

It follows a video posted on a pro-Russian YouTube account showing Djokovic's father Srdjan posing in Melbourne Park with a fan holding a Russian flag that featured the face of Vladimir Putin.

It sparked a backlash from Ukraine and led to calls for Djokovic senior to be banned from the tournament.

He decided to skip his son's semi-final victory on Friday and it remains to be seen if he will be at Sunday's final.

Tiley told the Melbourne Age newspaper he had spent "a fair amount of time talking to the Djokovic family,” AFP reported.

"My advice is that you have to be really careful because if this is an event of global significance, it's a platform," he said he told them.

"When you have hundreds of thousands of people come through the gate, you're going to naturally have some people that are coming here with an intention to be disruptive, and don't get yourself caught in the middle of that.

"And they completely understand that," he added. "The family were very good. They were upset that it was taken that way. There was no intention of it.

"His dad particularly does not support war and they're very focused on supporting peace."

Serbian star Djokovic insisted after his semi-final win there had been a "misinterpretation" of the images and his father had "no intention whatsoever to support any war initiatives".

He said his father had been greeting fans outside Rod Laver Arena after every match and had been "misused" on Wednesday night.

Tiley said the Open had more than 1,000 accredited journalists and growing TV audiences and "it does become a platform and that's new for us. It never used to be like that".

Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine last year, Russian and Belarusian players have normally competed under a neutral white flag as independents, as is the case at the Australian Open.

Spectators have been banned from having Russian or Belarusian flags at the Grand Slam after Ukraine's ambassador to Australia and New Zealand demanded action when they were seen among the crowd early in the tournament.



Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony: Saudi Team Highlights Cultural Heritage

Saudi athletes wave their country’s flag during the opening parade. (Saudi Olympic Committee)
Saudi athletes wave their country’s flag during the opening parade. (Saudi Olympic Committee)
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Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony: Saudi Team Highlights Cultural Heritage

Saudi athletes wave their country’s flag during the opening parade. (Saudi Olympic Committee)
Saudi athletes wave their country’s flag during the opening parade. (Saudi Olympic Committee)

Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al-Faisal, Chairman of the Saudi Olympic and Paralympic Committee, and his deputy, Prince Fahd bin Jalawi bin Abdulaziz, attended the opening ceremony of the 33rd Olympic Games in Paris.

Held outside the traditional stadiums for the first time in history, the ceremony featured a parade of the 206 participating countries on 100 boats traveling approximately 6 kilometers along the Seine River.

The Saudi show jumping team player, Ramzy Al-Duhami, and his colleague, the Saudi Taekwondo champion Dunya Aboutaleb, raised the Saudi flag at the opening of the world’s largest sporting event.

Al-Duhami expressed his pride in raising the Kingdom’s flag alongside his teammate, noting that it was a dream for any Saudi citizen. He wished success for the Saudi athletes in representing Saudi sports with distinction.

Aboutaleb, in turn, said he was honored to carry the Kingdom’s flag at the Olympic Games, stating: “I aspire to perform at a level that reflects the support and attention given to sports in the Kingdom.”

The Saudi athletes’ uniform was admired by the international media and the audience, who applauded the players the moment their boat appeared on the Seine River.

The designs for the opening ceremony were chosen through a national competition organized by the Saudi Arabian Olympic and Paralympic Committee, with the participation of designers from across the Kingdom.

Out of 128 competing designers, the chosen uniform by Saudi designer Alia Al-Salmi featured traditional men’s thobes and bishts and brightly patterned thobe al-nashal for women, symbolizing the athletes’ pride in their homeland and cultural roots.

Mashael Al-Ayed, 17, will be the first Saudi athlete to compete, taking to the pool for the 200 meters freestyle swimming event on July 28. Al-Ayed is the first female swimmer to represent Saudi Arabia at the Olympics.