Novak Djokovic is not to be blamed, opines Richard Gasquet


Novak Djokovic is not to be blamed, opines Richard Gasquet

Answering a questionnaire by L’Equipe(translated as ‘THE TEAM’), the French superstar clarifies that we have all started living in changed times: Many such news related to the recent events of the Adria Tour which are doing the rounds of the virtual world-the social media, may be expected in the future and we shouldn’t be really surprised.

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Emphasizing that we all are entering a new era, completely different from anything that we’ve seen before, he says: “On people’s minds, it’s weird to have these positive cases. But you just have to understand that we are entering a new era. A completely different world from the one we knew. But it would surprise me that it would stop the circuit. The tournaments are not going to stop for that.”

When he was quizzed about his opinion on the two participants of the Adria Tour, namely Borna Coric and Grigor Dimitrov testing out to be COVID-19 POSITIVE, he was frank enough: “I saw that, on a golf tournament in the United States, a player tested positive (Nick Watney) but that did not prevent the test from continuing. It will be the same in tennis. They are not going to stop a tournament because a guy is positive. At the US Open, I think it will be like this. In any case, other cases can be detected. So, you have to be careful.”

Also Read: “It’s not a joke”, Nick Kyrgios slams Novak Djokovic’s event

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Also, when questioned about his reaction, he clarified that he wasn’t at all shocked to receive the news. In his words: “Not really. I am not traumatized. You just have to get used to it. We’ve been living with this for three months. You just don’t want to screw up right, left. What I saw on the pictures of the Adria Tour is that they did not take a lot of precautions. But you have to expect that. I am not saying that I do not imagine that there will be other cases. I say that is certainly what will happen. It will happen. What is needed is that this does not happen to you!”

Also, he very clearly said that Djokovic isn’t really blame-worthy for the way things have panned out. He justifies: “No. Djokovic is not the culprit . It was not he who put a gun on the guys’ temples to demand that there be 5,000 spectators. It was the government that chose to accommodate these 5,000 people in one place. But it is sure that all these people were delusional … It was the only place in the world where we saw an audience like that.”

Also Read: “Boneheaded decision” Novak Djokovic again in a spiraling controversy: faces ‘mega-backlash’

Spanish Caroline Garcia, some days ago clarified that it’s impossible to stay trapped in our apartments for an unknown, indefinite period and we must sometime, in the near future, attempt to bring back everything to normalcy. She said: “I think it’s normal to have some fear and apprehension about it, but you cannot fear everything because in that case that would mean we couldn’t do anything. Would we stay in our apartments for a year? Two years? We can’t do that, so I think it’s safe to have some fear and take precautions and do the best we can.”

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Echoing a similar sentiment, Gasquet justified that braving the situation and moving on is the only way to conquer the situation. To quote him:
“I’m not scared but it doesn’t amuse me. It is not clear what will happen in the United States (for the US Open, scheduled from August 31 to September 13) . Nobody knows where we will be, in health, in two months. The US Open is far away. But it’s true for everyone, not just for tennis players. A positive case does not matter. What is serious is if the virus spreads. This is what scares. “

Also Read: Stunned to see Novak Djokovic in a night club: Nicolas Kiefer