Without the nuances that are clearly important in almost every case. SteroidsThe story that has put world number one tennis player Jannik Sinner in the eye of the storm in the past few hours is told as follows: In March, during the Indian Wells tournament, in the United States, the Italian physiotherapist cut off his finger with a scalpel. He walked for two days with his finger bandaged, and after removing the bandage, Sinner's physical trainer advised his colleague Staff for specific use sprayavailable without a prescription in Italy and which I happened to have on hand to help with recovery. For a week, my physical therapist, Giacomo Naldi, applied the treatment spray From his colleague, a medicine called Trofodermin was applied to his abused finger. During this period, he also did his job massaging the dented body of the group leader. classification ATP, who was also suffering in those days from dermatitis, which caused wounds in the skin of his back and feet.

Days later, Jannik Sinner tested positive for clostebol, a substance banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency, in two tests in March, which he was notified of in April. He was provisionally suspended on both occasions, but appealed the decisions to an independent tribunal, which accepted the Italian’s reasons. Sinner continued to play until the final decision was made. From April until last Tuesday, when the International Tennis Integrity Agency issued its ruling, nothing was made public.

Sinner is an innocent tennis player in the eyes of the ITIA and the independent panel set up by Sports Solutions, a company specialising in arbitrations of this type. Throughout the investigation, which began in early August, the court analysed documents, interviewed those involved and consulted “three experts in doping cases”. Sinner claimed that when he saw Naldi with a bandage around his finger, he asked the physiotherapist if he was taking any medication for the wound and Naldi assured him that he was not. In fact, he only started using Trofodermin a few days later, without informing the tennis player at all. The court therefore deemed Sinner “not guilty or negligent” because he took all precautions and could not have known that there was a possibility of contamination by a third party, in this case the physiotherapist, who did not use gloves during his massage. The Italian’s wounds on his body also allowed Clostebol to enter his system.

Double standards?

The justifications for ITIA are explained in detail in A. 33 page document It was announced on Tuesday. But they didn’t end up being well-received by some in the tennis community. Controversial Australian Nick Kyrgios was among the first to react, calling the decision “ridiculous.” Portugal’s Gastao Elias spoke about how tennis had “become a joke.”

“Whether it was accidental or voluntary. You tested positive twice for a banned substance… It takes two years [de suspensão]“Your game has improved,” Kyrgios wrote.

As for the performance improvement, the ITIA report leaves doubts, as the presence of the banned substance in Jannik Sinner's urine was very small. David Cowan, one of the experts consulted during the investigation, confirmed in the document that the “small amount” of clostebol present in the Italian's body would not be enough to “appropriately improve performance”.

But what bothers the vast majority of tennis players who have spoken out is the swift and secretive way in which this particular episode has been handled, leaving in the air the idea of ​​justice for some, in this case for the world’s No. 1 tennis player, and less lenient and modest justice for other athletes without the media attention of a trans-Alpine player who made his Grand Slam debut this year, at the Australian Open.

Unlike other cases, where the preventive suspension was not lifted until the final verdict, Jannik Sinner continued to compete. And even win tournaments. “I can’t imagine how other athletes who have been suspended for doping must feel now. Different rules for different players,” wrote former world top 10 player Denis Shapovalov in X. Briton Liam Broady noted that athletes in the same situation as the Italian have waited “months and even years” for their “innocence to be declared.”

The most famous case of a tennis player being banned and later cleared is that of Simona Halep. The former world number one and two-time Grand Slam winner was provisionally suspended in October 2022 by the ITIA, after testing positive for roxadustat at that year’s US Open and also for abnormalities in her biological passport. After eleven long months, the ban was set at four years. Halep appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which in March this year concluded that the positive result was due to a contaminated supplement and that the abnormalities in the athlete’s biological passport could be linked to a recent operation. The ban was increased from four years to nine months, but the Romanian has not competed for over a year. He is currently outside the top 1,000 and trying to revive his career.

Another example of this clear difference in treatment is the case of Tara Moore, a British woman who received the best rating in classification The 145th ranked player was provisionally suspended by the WTA in May 2022 after testing positive for boldenone and nandrolone in a control procedure at a tournament in Colombia. She was only found “not guilty or negligent” in December 2023, after it was determined that the positive result was due to contaminated meat. She was unable to compete for 19 months.

In X, Moore began commenting on the case, lamenting that “only the image of the top players matters.” Later, he stressed that he had nothing “against Sinner” and that the protest from the tennis world should be “directed at the institutions” and not at the player. “I’m glad his process was quick and smooth. Anyone who has been through this knows how horrible and brutal this process is, it not only destroys your career but also your self-esteem. I’ve spoken to other players who have been through this and they all share the same feeling: sadness,” the British woman wrote, leaving the question: “Why aren’t we treated with the same trust and respect as tennis players from classification higher?”

Cagla Buyukakcay, a former top-60 player from Turkey who was suspended for almost a year between 2021 and 2022 and was later cleared by the ITIA, speaks of a “stressful” process and a “financial burden” that is extremely heavy, especially for tennis players who do not have the resources of those who roam the top places. classification“It is incredibly unfair that some of us are treated differently under the same rules.”

ATP CEO Ahmed Nassar welcomed the results of the investigation into Jannik Sinner, but called for “transparent and consistent processes for all players,” whether they are “No. 1, No. 100 or No. 1,000.” classificationWhether men or women.

Clostebol: An Italian Problem

Unlike many other tennis players, Jannik Sinner's operation lasted only four months, during which the tennis player did not stop playing, and eventually lost only Prize money And points for classification He won at Indian Wells, where he fell in the semifinals. Since then, he has won the tournament in Halle, Germany, in June, and last week won the Masters 1,000m in Cincinnati. Those titles were not taken away from him.

In the document provided by the ITIA detailing the investigation, it was revealed that Sinner saw the two provisional suspensions lifted quickly because the independent tribunal appointed to the case was “comfortably satisfied with the conclusive evidence presented by the player, with the laboratory’s approval of the statements and with the written submissions of the parties.”

The three doping experts heard in the case agreed that there was a case of “contamination” without the player's knowledge, considering their explanations “very plausible”. Two of the three doctors did not know the tennis player's identity during the analysis of the case.

Yannik Sinner is not the only Italian athlete to have tested positive for clostebol. Honest Sport reveals that between 2019 and 2023, 38 Alpine athletes tested positive for the substance. The ITIA report states that “50% of anti-doping procedures related to clostebol were detected in Italy”. Trofodermin, medicine Which may have caused the Sinner contamination, is mainly sold in Italy, where it can be purchased spray Or an over-the-counter cream at a low price. Clostebol, which began use in Germany in the 1980s, is considered a less powerful steroid than other anabolic substances, but it can contribute to increasing muscle mass and reducing recovery time.

In recent years, several Italian tennis players have tested positive for clostebol, such as the young Matilda Paoletti and Mariano Tammaro, both 17, in 2021. Stefano Battaglino, who has never broken into the top 700, was banned for four years after failing to prove his innocence following a positive test. Battaglino has been provisionally suspended since February 2023 and had to wait until November of the same year for a final ruling.

The case most similar to Jannik Sinner's – even in terms of the speed of the operation – was carried out by Marco Bortolotti, number 87 in classification Of the couples who tested positive for clostipol during the category tournament, competitor In Portugal, in October 2023. In February of this year, the presence of the banned substance in the Italian's analyses was confirmed, and a month later, the ITIA stated that, based on scientific studies and other cases already recorded, it accepted the tennis player's explanations and established that “involuntary contamination”. Bortolotti did not implement any provisional suspension.