Fifa and doping

Day -827. WorldCup2018

As of yesterday Maria Sharapova is known as the drug-cheat, the tennis player that took performance enhancing drugs, or the one player who was finally caught. When the Lance Armstrong scandal broke, it became apparent how rife doping in cycling was, more than just the annual positive tests at the Tour de France. Then last year we listened in awe as news of the widespread drug use in Russian track and field was broken. Now tennis. As with the cyclists before Armstrong, was she just not smart enough to avoid being caught? Questions will be asked of tennis as a whole, the debate will start.

And football? There have been a few cases of players testing positive for recreational drugs, cocaine, marijauna. These were players who were not looking for any competitive advantage but maybe ways to deal with the stress of being more of a celebrity in the public eye than an athlete, or the disappointment of an injury. The most famous footballer playing under the influence of quite the cocktail of drugs was of course the one and only, the legend Diego Maradona. As a role model, there is no doubt that him being kicked out of the 1994 World Cup for being so obviously high that he was on a different planet was not a particularly good example to set. If you have not seen it watch his crazy-eyes celebration after his goal against Greece. But, and I am definitely not in any way condoning this kind of drug use, whereas with Armstong I felt he was competing on a level playing field and he was the best of all the dopers, when I watched Maradona, in hindsight, it is amazing what he could do when he was probably so out of it for many years.

And he was always better than Messi.

I have listened to arguments for allowable, or legalised, or controlled "doping" and it makes a lot of sense. It is very sad what has become of Maradona after his career ended, probably because of the incredible amount of chemicals that entered his body over a number of years. But if athletes take supplements that you and I can legally ingest that will help their bodies cope with the stresses of high level competition and these supplements do no harm, then why not?

After cycling, track and field and now tennis, football's time may come. Just as the International Tennis Federation maintains that it is very strict about testing and that there is no problem despite suggestions from the top players that this is not completely true, so does Fifa say that it does a great job of self-monitoring. But read this great opinion in the New York Times. It's almost 2 years old and concerned the 2014 World Cup, but is still very relevant.

Maradona, in 1994, was probably very easy to catch. He was a target as he had a history having been banned in 1991 for 15 months. And he had a problem. Fifa had better make sure it gets in line with drug testing and we don't face yet another football scandal at Russia 2018, as well as the risk of any more players going down the Maradona post playing career self-destruction.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/21/sports/worldcup/no-doping-at-the-world-cup-thats-what-fifa-says.html?_r=0