Federer Rejected $1 Million Saudi Offer, Nadal, Djokovic Face Questions For Accepting

Roger Federer has revealed he refused the $1 million offer from the organizers of the government-sponsored event to play in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in an exhibition match on Dec. 22.

Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic are facing a backlash for accepting the offer to play an exhibition match in Saudi despite the furor surrounding the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. It is alleged the Middle East nation is behind the murder following his criticism of the Saudi government.

The lucrative exhibition tournament will take place in December and at the moment has the blessing of the world’s number one and two ranked players. Nadal and Djokovic are being urged to cancel their appearance in Jeddah, but both the players are yet to make a decision.

The Serbian revealed during a recent press conference in Paris his team is in touch with the organizers of the tournament and a decision will be made once more details become clear.

"My team is in touch with Saudi Arabia and we're all talking to understand the situation better,” Djokovic said, as per BBC Sport. "I don't like to involve myself in any political exchange or situations. And it's unfortunate that we are both drawn into this right now.”

"Right now we just don't have obviously enough information, and we have to look into that a bit more and then we'll make our decision soon,” he added.

Nadal was also non-committal when asked about his decision and indicated it was difficult to pull out as they had signed the deal to play the exhibition match over a year ago. He was sympathetic about the journalist’s murder, but his stance remained the same as Djokovic.

"Of course I'm aware of all the situation. But I had a commitment since one year ago to play there. And my team is talking to them, to analyze the things. That's it,” Nadal said.

"It's terrible that one journalist lost his life. I know something happened very bad inside there. So we are looking about how evolves the situation and I hope the things will clarify as soon as possible,” the Spaniard added.

Federer, who is also in Paris along with his two longtime rivals for the ongoing Rolex Masters, revealed that he turned down the offer, which is expected to pay $1 million each to both Nadal and Djokovic.

The Swiss ace, however, refused to blame the incident for his refusal but insisted he preferred to practice rather than play a tournament, which is expected to be part of the players’ preparation for the 2019 season.

“They contacted me too, yeah,” Federer said, as quoted by the Daily Mail. “Because I don’t want to play. It’s OK. I’m happy practicing. I’m happy doing other things, and I didn’t want to play there at that time. So, for me, it was a quick decision,” he added, explaining why he turned down the offer.