2024-08-22 00:55:28
Discontent over the doping pardon of world number 1 tennis player Yannick Syner has run rampant, with Canada’s Denis Shapovalov and Australia’s Nick Kyrgios voicing it.
They are talking about double standards after the Italian was not punished despite having given two positive doping tests this year.
The International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) announced yesterday that an independent tribunal had cleared Syner to continue competing.
“I can’t imagine how any other player who gets a doping ban feels right now. Different rules for different tennis players,” Shapovalov wrote on social media.
The Italian tested positive for closteball at the Indian Wells tournament in March with small amounts of the banned substance found in his body again after a new test days later, but the 23-year-old successfully challenged the provisional ban.
Siner, who was eliminated in the semifinals of this tournament, was deprived of only 400 points for the world ranking and 325 thousand dollars from the prize fund.
The Australian Open champion claimed the substance entered his body after receiving a massage from his physiotherapist, who used a spray containing clostebol on his own finger wound.
“Ridiculous – whether it was accidental or planned. You get tested twice and each of those tests shows you’ve used a banned substance.
You should be gone for 2 years. Your performance has been artificially enhanced. Massage cream? Yes, good! It doesn’t matter what amount we’re talking about, and how could any member of his team let such an absurdity happen? Keep these fictions to yourself. He should be gone,” Kyrgios wrote.
Frenchman Luca Puy and American Tennys Sandgren also criticized the decision.