Recently, in the midst of the controversy over Simona Halep’s charges being reversed, Nick Kyrgios responded to claims that she had been “doping heavily.”The International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) banned Halep for four years in 2023 after she tested positive for Roxadustat during the 2022 US Open and for breaking anti-doping regulations.
However, the former World No. 1 appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), claiming that contaminated nutritional supplements were the cause of her positive test. CAS investigated the appeal, resulting in the overturning of the ITIA’s decision and reducing the doping ban to nine months. Since Halep had already been serving her suspension since October 2022, she was able to return to the court immediately.Simona Halep received a wild card entry to the ongoing Miami Open main draw after her doping ban was lifted. She faced Paula Badosa in her first-round match but was defeated by the Spaniard with a score of 1-6, 6-4, 6-3.
..Irish sports writer David Walsh, who gained notoriety for his work exposing American road racer Lance Armstrong’s doping scheme, attacked the CAS’s probe into Simona Halep’s case in a recent piece for The Times, claiming it was inadequate and careless. Walsh voiced worries that the decision did not “inspire confidence” in the anti-doping case regulations.
In response to Walsh’s article, tennis commentator Myles David claimed that Simona Halep had engaged in heavy doping but had her ban overturned due to her popularity.
David Walsh explains why the CAS decision in the Halep case is simply absurd. Reminder: As the ITIA stated im their decision Halep would have needed to ingest 5,000 times the recommended daily dose of the supplement to produce the concentration of roxadustat found in her sample. pic.twitter.com/JXKCCm78v5
— Jannik Schneider (@schnejan) March 25, 2024