“What he did was within the rules,” Daniil Medvedev defends Jannik Sinner in doping scandal but feels ‘rules are a bit vague’

Daniil Medvedev does not blame Jannik Sinner for violating any rules following the Italian's doping scandal.

“What he did was within the rules,” Daniil Medvedev defends Jannik Sinner in doping scandal but feels ‘rules are a bit vague’

Jannik Sinner (inset) and Daniil Medvedev {via Imago}

The Jannik Sinner doping violation case garnered a lot of attention since it became public. While the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) and the ATP were mainly targeted for giving preferential treatment to the Italian, Sinner also faced criticism.

However, Daniil Medvedev, while speaking on the matter, made it clear that what Sinner did was within the rules. The Russian also admitted that the rules are vague.

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With Sinner continuing to compete on the tour despite two doping violations, questions were raised about the fairness of the decision. The ITIA has since clarified that a provisional suspension was automatically applied after Sinner twice tested positive for a banned substance and that the Italian successfully appealed against it in both instances.

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My perspective is it’s only him who knows what happened exactly. So we cannot know. Nobody knows the exact truth except him and his team and maybe the Independent Tribunal. I hope this situation can be the same for every player and every player can defend himself because I think what he did was within the rules. It’s just the rules are a bit vague
Daniil Medvdev said at a US Open press conference

The 28-year-old pointed to this loophole in the rules and said that Sinner could defend himself because he knew what had exactly happened.

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Jannik SInner (2)

Daniil Medvedev points out the problem with the doping rules

Daniil Medvedev expressed his concern for players who were unaware of the source of the banned substance when they test positive. He said that if a player is informed that their sample contained a banned substance and they did not know the source, they will have to serve the suspension. The former World No. 1 reckons that this was the tricky part of the doping rules.

Jannik SInner (2)
Jannik Sinner (Via Imago)
For me the only thing where I’m a little bit like doping cases make me scared is imagine, so, he knew what happened, & good for him. So he managed to defend himself. Imagine whatever player in the top 100 gets an email, and they say there was cocaine in your blood. And you come to them and say ‘I never did anything in my life. I don’t know how it got there.’ And when you don’t know you get suspended. That’s a little bit the tricky part.
Daniil Medvedev opined

It is worth noting that there have been two recent cases of doping violations in the tennis circuit which are in a way similar to Jannik Sinner‘s case. Simona Halep was banned for four years for the presence of roxadustat in her samples. However, upon appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS), she got it reduced to nine months because the banned substance entered her body through a supplement she consumed and it was not intentional.

Meanwhile, British doubles player Tara Moore had to wait for 19 months to get a verdict for her doping violation despite the player bearing no fault or negligence. The banned substance had entered her system through contaminated meat.

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