“He puts himself in danger,” Reilly Opelka claims Novak Djokovic’s ‘non-diplomatic’ attitude is what makes him the undisputed greatest tennis player of all time

The tallest ever ATP player Reilly Opelka feels that Novak Djokovic is the tallest in stature when compared with his peers. The American who is currently not playing tennis, said confessed that he believes Novak Djokovic has a lot of courage. Opelka was talking about how the tennis environment is getting very difficult with Social media and bad journalism.

Opelka was talking on a Podcast for the Tennis Channel. He spoke about how he admires Novak Djokovic’s strong mindset. Opelka said in the podcast, “People like to criticize Novak Djokovic, yet he has applied these concepts that he has on life, like having the courage to take a stand, not playing both sides of the coin like his peers do, facing a tough situation“. Opelka added saying that Novak’s undeterred quality of standing up to what he believes makes him the greatest tennis player of all time.

Reilly Opelka is currently on hiatus from playing tennis. He had an injury ridden 2022 and hasn’t played a match since August 2022. Though Opelka and Novak Djokovic have never met head-to-head in a tournament, the American speaks very highly of the Serb. He feels that Djokovic is not scared to put himself in a dangerous position if it’s for something he believes in. Opelka said, “He (Novak Djokovic) puts himself in danger and I respect that, partly because the media has never given him a fair share because, as I said, he doesn’t play the game of what they want to hear“.

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Times when Novak Djokovic has stuck to his principles

Novak Djokovic is universally condemned for not taking the COVID-19 vaccination. He was not allowed to compete at the Australian and US Open in 2022 due to his non-vaccinated status. He missed out on a lot of other important tournaments. Despite the negative impact his vaccination status had on his career, he stuck to his belief. Right or wrong one can’t say, but he was not one to flip his decision just for convenience.

Novak has also spoken openly about various issues in Tennis. For instance, he has spoken openly about Prize money parity between Men and Women tennis players. He was one of the few to come out and say that the ban on Russian and Belarusian players by Wimbledon was wrong. He was also very vocal about his thoughts on the sexual assault social media debacle of Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai. When Peng Shuai went missing for a few days, Djokovic tweeted demanding to know about her whereabouts and an inquiry to happen on her assault charges.

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