Australian Open to require players to be vaccinated against COVID

• The announcement also comes as Novak Djokovic, the No. 1-ranked men's tennis player, declines to disclose whether he is vaccinated. The nine-time Australian Open champion had said he would wait for the tournament's policy before making a decision on whether to participate, per the NYT.
• Tiley said around 80% of the player cohort were vaccinated and would play in front of capacity crowds, per Reuters.

Flashback: Melbourne, where the tournament takes place, has been considered the "world's most locked-down city" with some of the strictest COVID-19 measures in the world.

• Fans were initially allowed to attend the tournament earlier this year before an outbreak forced 600 players and staff to isolate and the tournament to ban fans.
• Spectators were allowed back in after a five-day lockdown.

Of note: The Australian Open is the first Grand Slam tournament to implement a COVID-19 vaccination requirement.

What they're saying: “All the staff working the Australian Open will need to be vaccinated, but when we’re in a state where there’s more than 90 percent of the population fully vaccinated — they’ve done a magnificent job with that — it’s the right thing to do," Tiley said, per NYT.

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