Djokovic calls for overhaul of ‘unfair’ anti-doping system

Novak Djokovic said a majority of players he has spoken to were unhappy with how the anti-doping process was being handled. (EPA Images pic)DOHA: Novak Djokovic urged tennis authorities to overhaul the sport’s anti-doping system on Monday, pointing to “inconsistencies” in cases involving top stars Jannik Sinner and Iga Swiatek and those of lower-ranked players.World No 1 Sinner agreed to a three-month ban on Saturday, admitting “partial responsiblity” for mistakes by his team which led to him twice testing positive for traces of clostebol in March last year.Sinner was facing a potential ban of two years after the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against his initial exoneration by the International Tennis Integrity Agency (Itia), announced in August.In a surprising move, Wada withdrew its appeal and came to an agreement with Sinner to accept a three-month ban.In another high-profile case last year, five-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek accepted a one-month ban after testing positive for the banned heart drug trimetazidine.“There’s a majority of the players that I’ve talked to in the locker room, not just in the past few days, but also the past few months, that are not happy with the way this whole process has been handled,” Djokovic said.“A majority of the players don’t feel that it’s fair. A majority of the players feel like there is favouritism happening. It seems like, it appears that you can almost affect the outcome if you are a top player, if you have access to the top lawyers.”In contrast, the recently retired Simona Halep, a former world No 1, was handed a four-year ban by Itia in 2022 after testing positive for the blood-boosting drug roxadustat.She argued it was the result of a tainted supplement and successfully appealed to CAS, which reduced her suspension to nine months.“Simona Halep and (Britain’s) Tara Moore and some other players that are maybe less known that have been struggling to resolve their cases for years, or have gotten the ban for years,” said Djokovic.“There is so much inconsistency between the cases.”Djokovic, who is returning to action this week at the Qatar Open for the first time since retiring injured from last month’s Australian Open semifinals, believes a change is needed.“Right now it’s a ripe time for us to really address the system, because the system and the structure obviously doesn’t work (for) anti-doping, it’s obvious,” he said.“I hope that in the next period of the near future that the governing bodies are going to come together, of our tours and the tennis ecosystem, and try to find a more effective way to deal with these processes.“It’s inconsistent, and it appears to be very unfair.”“If you are going to treat every case individually or independently, which is what’s happening, then there’s no consistency, then there is no transparency, and some cases are transparent, some are not,” he continued.“The problem is that right now there is a lack of trust generally from the tennis players, both male and female, towards Wada and Itia, and the whole process.”

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Djokovic calls for overhaul of ‘unfair’ anti-doping system

The Serbian star points to inconsistencies in cases involving top players with access to lawyers, while lower-ranked players face a protracted battle.

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