London, Feb 15: Top-ranked tennis player Jannik Sinner accepted a three-month ban in a settlement with the World Anti-Doping Agency and said Saturday the agreement ends a case that was “hanging over me” since his two positive doping tests nearly a year ago.
WADA, which was seeking to ban the three-time Grand Slam champion from the sport for at least one year, had challenged a decision last year by the International Tennis Integrity Agency not to suspend Sinner for what the ITIA judged was accidental contamination by a banned anabolic steroid last March.
Sinner’s explanation – that trace amounts of Clostebol in his doping sample was due to a massage from a trainer who used the substance after cutting his own finger – had been accepted.
The timing means the 23-year-old Italian won’t miss any Grand Slam tournaments. The French Open, the season’s next major, starts May 25.
“This case had been hanging over me now for nearly a year and the process still had a long time to run with a decision maybe only at the end of the year,” Sinner, who won the Australian Open in January, said in a statement.
“I have always accepted that I am responsible for my team and realize WADA’s strict rules are an important protection for the sport I love. On that basis I have accepted WADA’s offer to resolve these proceedings on the basis of a three-month sanction.”
The Montreal-based WADA had originally appealed the ITIA’s ruling to the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland. It has formally withdrawn the appeal.
“WADA accepts the athlete’s explanation for the cause of the violation as outlined in the first instance decision. WADA accepts that Mr. Sinner did not intend to cheat, and that his exposure to Clostebol did not provide any performance-enhancing benefit and took place without his knowledge as the result of negligence of members of his entourage,” it said in Saturday’s announcement.
“However,” the WADA statement continued, “under the code and by virtue of CAS precedent, an athlete bears responsibility for the entourage’s negligence. Based on the unique set of facts of this case, a three-month suspension is deemed to be an appropriate outcome. As previously stated, WADA did not seek a disqualification of any results, save that which was previously imposed by the tribunal of first instance.”
WADA added that the International Tennis Federation and ITIA, “both co-respondents to WADA’s CAS appeal, neither of which appealed the first-instance decision, both accepted the case resolution agreement.?” (AP)
