The Australian Open kicked off earlier this week, and one notable player wasn’t there: Novak Djokovic. The world’s top tennis player, who has triumphed over the competition in Australia a total of nine times, made headlines when he arrived in Melbourne for the tournament, and was kindly asked to leave the continent given that he’s not vaccinated against COVID. And if there’s one person who’s really enjoying this story, it’s The Daily Show host Trevor Noah.
On Wednesday, Noah shared some clips of various global news broadcasts reporting on Djokovic’s deportation back to Serbia and how the Australian government canceled his visa over concerns that “his presence could lead to an increase in anti-vaccination sentiment and even civil unrest.” While Djokovic did have a medical exemption from Australia’s vaccination mandates due to a recent bout with COVID, an estimated 71 percent of Australians wanted the athlete barred from entering the country.
“Damn! It says a lot about you when that many Australians think you’re too dangerous to be in their country,” Noah said. “I mean, this is the country whose health minister is a giant poisonous spider.”
The worst part about this whole ordeal, as Noah sees it, isn’t seeing the top-ranked athlete in a sport turned away and unable to defend his title. It’s spending 25 hours flying all the way to Australia only to then have to turn around and spend another day of your life flying away from Australia. “I don’t know what Djokovic thinks is in the vaccine,” Noah said, “but it can’t possibly be worse than breathing in farts for 50 hours straight.”
You can watch the full clip above.