Simona Halep questioned the “huge distinction” in how doping circumstances are handled after world No. 2 Iga Swiatek was handed a one-month ban whereas the Romanian was out of motion for over 18 months following two separate anti-doping violations.
The Worldwide Tennis Integrity Company (ITIA) stated Thursday that Swiatek had accepted a one-month suspension after testing optimistic for the banned substance trimetazidine (TMZ).
The Pole examined optimistic in August however the ITIA, which runs tennis’s anti-doping program, accepted that it was attributable to contamination of her remedy melatonin.
Halep was provisionally suspended in October 2022 and later banned for 4 years, a interval which was decreased to 9 months in March after an enchantment on the Courtroom of Arbitration for Sport.
She had strongly denied knowingly taking the banned substance roxadustat and stated she had proof to point out small quantities of the anemia drug entered her system from a contaminated licensed complement.
“I stand and ask myself, why is there such an enormous distinction in remedy and judgment?” former world No. 1 Halep stated in a put up on Instagram on Thursday. “I can not discover and I do not suppose there could be a logical reply.
“It will probably solely be dangerous will from the ITIA, the organisation that has completed completely all the things to destroy me regardless of the proof … It was painful, it’s painful and possibly the injustice that was completed to me will all the time be painful.”
Reuters has contacted the ITIA for remark.
Former Wimbledon and French Open champion Halep had criticized tennis authorities for the size of time it took to course of her case. After her provisional suspension in October 2022, Halep obtained her four-year ban in September 2023.
Swiatek, who was world No. 1 when she failed the check, was provisionally suspended Sept. 12, however had it lifted Oct. 4, leaving her with simply over every week’s ban to serve.
Gamers on each excursions referred to as out what they perceived as double requirements within the sport when males’s world No. 1 Jannik Sinner was cleared of wrongdoing regardless of failing two drug assessments earlier this yr.
An unbiased tribunal accepted the Italian’s clarification that the anabolic agent clostebol had entered his system from a member of his help crew by way of massages and sports activities remedy.
Sinner may nonetheless be banned for as much as two years with the World Anti-Doping Company interesting the choice in his case at sport’s highest court docket.
Amid questions in regards to the dealing with of the circumstances of Swiatek and Sinner, ITIA chief government Karen Moorhouse stated at a media briefing Thursday: “These aren’t circumstances of intentional doping. We’re coping with inadvertent breaches of the principles.
“So I do not suppose this can be a trigger for concern for tennis followers. The truth that we’re being clearly open, clear, and it exhibits the breadth and depth of our anti-doping program.”
The Skilled Tennis Gamers Affiliation (PTPA), which was established by Novak Djokovic and Vasek Pospisil in 2020, stated late Thursday that tennis wanted an anti-doping system rooted in transparency, consistency and objectivity.
“Gamers deserve and are entitled to due course of and help in navigating the anti-doping system, no matter rating and entry to assets … [They] deserve and are entitled to governance that they belief,” the advocacy group added.
“Our struggle to overtake the failing tennis system continues.”
