NBL considering replacements for unvaccinated players: Loeliger

NBL Commissioner Jeremy Loeliger has revealed the league is considering introducing a replacement player system for unvaccinated players for away teams during the 2021/22 season.

The NBL season is scheduled to begin on November 18 with the hope increased vaccination rates across Australia and New Zealand will enable as many home fans as possible to attend games.

Higher vaccination rates could also potentially lead to eased border control restrictions, allowing the league to complete a season with minimal interruptions.

However, if unvaccinated individuals can’t travel interstate, Loeliger says the NBL may make replacement players available to the travelling team.  

“That’s one idea that we’ve canvased with players, teams and the players’ association,” Loeliger told News Corp Australia.

“We are not a legislative government, so we are not going to mandate that someone puts something into their body if it is against a cultural or religious belief for example.

“Instead, we would try and look at alternatives for both the player and the team to lessen the extent of the issue, but one significant difference to NRL or AFL is that we are talking about a much smaller number of players.

“Allowing for injury replacements would be the first step in the right direction, but like everything in the COVID environment, it remains subject to review once we have a proper understanding of how many players would choose not to be vaccinated.

“But our understanding from discussions with the players’ association is that the vast majority of players are intending on getting vaccinated.”

Loeliger also added the NBL plans to run vaccination education sessions for players, clubs and staff once they’re able to.

“We can’t undertake that educational component yet because we don’t know what the government sanctioned implications will be,” he said.

“We know once we get a 70 to 80 per cent threshold governments are likely to introduce policy or law that will treat people differently depending on whether they are vaccinated.

“All we can do is keep the players abreast of the fact that if they choose not to be vaccinated, it might mean that you can’t travel to this away game.

“We might have to revisit that if something changes and we were made aware that the extent of the problem was made bigger, but for the time being I think it can be addressed in that fashion.”