MOSCOW: There have been no positive results from over 3,000 anti-doping tests carried out before and during the World Cup, FIFA said on Thursday.
FIFA collected 2,761 samples prior to the tournament and another 626 during it, including 108 collected on non-matchdays, as part of the largest-ever World Cup testing programme.
“The regular tests were complemented by FIFA’s use of the athlete biological passport programme in WADA’s “ADAMS” system, under which all test results, including those from confederations and NADOs collected at the main international football events as well as national competitions, are gathered in the athlete’s passport in ADAMS, which features a haematological module (through blood) and a steroidal module (through urine),” FIFA said in a statement.
“FIFA’s Athlete Passport Management Unit, composed of independent experts, reviews the data of players to detect potential deviations that may indicate an abuse of performance-enhancing drugs. This applied to all participating players at the FIFA World Cup.”
For this year’s tournament, every participating player was tested in unannounced controls before the competition and further systematic tests have been performed during it, both with post-match controls and on non-matchdays.
Around 90 percent of all tests were targeted, based on a number of criteria, including the recommendations of the Athlete Passport Management Unit, potential injuries suffered by the players, performance data and the athletes’ test history.
On average, every player from the four remaining teams has been tested 4.41 times since January, with some of them tested eight times.
There was one adverse analytical finding but the player was in possession of a therapeutic use exemption for the substance detected. There were also three atypical findings. (Reuters)
