Post by Macmoish on Oct 5, 2010 6:42:53 GMT
Guardian
Players unions call for leniency over recreational drugs
• Football and cricket officials want Wada to review prohibited list
• Athletes can get two-year ban for taking cocaine and marijuana
The player unions representing footballers and cricketers in England have called for recreational drugs to be removed from the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited list. Rather than punishing athletes who test positive for cocaine and marijuana during in-competition testing with a two-year ban for a first offence, the groups are appealing for leniency with a focus on rehabilitation.
"We have to make sure that a guy struggling with a problem can step forward and receive help to get that issue addressed without the possibility of being suspended or – even worse than that – losing his contract," said John Bramhall, the deputy chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association. "For the number of players who have tested positive for cocaine, the consequences are far from performance-enhancing and the outcomes in the majority of cases have been very negative."
Ian Smith, the Professional Cricketers' Association's legal director, agreed that recreational drug use is not usually about gaining an unfair advantage. He said: "Marijuana is not a big issue with cheating in sport – let's get it off the [Wada] list".
In one of football's most notorious cases of recreational drug use, the Romania striker Adrian Mutu was banned for seven months and fired by Chelsea after testing positive for cocaine in 2004. A lengthy legal process concluded earlier this year with a court ordering Mutu to pay Chelsea €17m (£14.6m) in compensation. Mutu is currently suspended after receiving a separate nine-month ban for failing two drug tests for a banned stimulant.
Bramhall wants football to be allowed to address the underlying social problems that lead to players using party drugs. He said: "We need to look at a method for football to deal with those issues, but take the sanctions and the punitive nature of those sanctions away from the players to give them the opportunity to do that"
"We accept that in some sports, cocaine could be used for performance-enhancing. But within football, I think it is a social issue more than anything else and the backgrounds players come from and the use in their social environments."
The two players unions are in contact with the Football Association about trying to change the Wada rules.
"Footballers are targets today for [recreational drugs] because of the money they are earning – you want [rules] to try and act as a deterrent," said Trevor Brooking, the FA's director of football. "You want them to get the treatment needed to get out of it. If the punishment is less, they have to go through a course of rehab and programs to make sure they don't repeat it.
"Whatever you say, it will affect their performance. And you don't want to make it too easy an excuse, that it's only recreational drugs, because it's still a serious issue."
www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2010/oct/04/wada-drugs-in-sport
Players unions call for leniency over recreational drugs
• Football and cricket officials want Wada to review prohibited list
• Athletes can get two-year ban for taking cocaine and marijuana
The player unions representing footballers and cricketers in England have called for recreational drugs to be removed from the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited list. Rather than punishing athletes who test positive for cocaine and marijuana during in-competition testing with a two-year ban for a first offence, the groups are appealing for leniency with a focus on rehabilitation.
"We have to make sure that a guy struggling with a problem can step forward and receive help to get that issue addressed without the possibility of being suspended or – even worse than that – losing his contract," said John Bramhall, the deputy chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association. "For the number of players who have tested positive for cocaine, the consequences are far from performance-enhancing and the outcomes in the majority of cases have been very negative."
Ian Smith, the Professional Cricketers' Association's legal director, agreed that recreational drug use is not usually about gaining an unfair advantage. He said: "Marijuana is not a big issue with cheating in sport – let's get it off the [Wada] list".
In one of football's most notorious cases of recreational drug use, the Romania striker Adrian Mutu was banned for seven months and fired by Chelsea after testing positive for cocaine in 2004. A lengthy legal process concluded earlier this year with a court ordering Mutu to pay Chelsea €17m (£14.6m) in compensation. Mutu is currently suspended after receiving a separate nine-month ban for failing two drug tests for a banned stimulant.
Bramhall wants football to be allowed to address the underlying social problems that lead to players using party drugs. He said: "We need to look at a method for football to deal with those issues, but take the sanctions and the punitive nature of those sanctions away from the players to give them the opportunity to do that"
"We accept that in some sports, cocaine could be used for performance-enhancing. But within football, I think it is a social issue more than anything else and the backgrounds players come from and the use in their social environments."
The two players unions are in contact with the Football Association about trying to change the Wada rules.
"Footballers are targets today for [recreational drugs] because of the money they are earning – you want [rules] to try and act as a deterrent," said Trevor Brooking, the FA's director of football. "You want them to get the treatment needed to get out of it. If the punishment is less, they have to go through a course of rehab and programs to make sure they don't repeat it.
"Whatever you say, it will affect their performance. And you don't want to make it too easy an excuse, that it's only recreational drugs, because it's still a serious issue."
www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2010/oct/04/wada-drugs-in-sport