Halep was appalled at how Swiatek’s doping case was handled compared to her own

Former Wimbledon and French Open champion tennis player Simona Halep has expressed her dismay at the way Iga Swiatek’s doping case was handled compared to her own.

Romanian Halep, 33, who initially received a four-year ban for doping, said there were significant differences in the way her cases were handled by tennis authorities.

“I sit down and try to understand, but it’s really impossible for me to understand something like this,” Halep said. He shared on Instagram on Friday bill. “I sit and wonder: ‘Why is there such a huge difference in treatment and judgment?’

“I can’t find a logical answer and I don’t think there can be. This may be due to the malevolence of ITIA, the organization that did absolutely everything to destroy me despite the evidence.”

The International Tennis Integrity Agency announced on Thursday that five-time major champion Swiatek had accepted a one-month suspension after testing positive for the banned substance trimetazidine, a heart medication known as TMZ.

The 23-year-old Polish player failed an out-of-competition drugs test in August and the ITIA accepted his explanation that the result was unintentional and caused by contamination of melatonin, an over-the-counter medication Swiatek took for the problems. with jet lag and sleep.

Halep, who won the French Open in 2018 and Wimbledon in 2019, was suspended for four years after her test was positive. for the banned drug Roxadustat At the 2022 US Open.

his removal Reduced to nine months by the Court of Arbitration for Sport After CAS accepted its explanation for the contaminated supplement. But he missed I’ve been playing for 1 1/2 years.

“I always believed in goodness, I believed in the justice of this sport, I believed in goodness,” Halep wrote on Instagram. How can ITIA have completely different approaches against me in similar cases occurring at almost the same time (of the season)?”

Swiatek’s case prompted men’s tennis player Nick Kyrgios, the 2022 Wimbledon runner-up, to post, “OUR SPORT HAS BEEN COOKED.” in xformerly Twitter.

Canadian tennis player Denis Shapovalov, ranked 56th, shared a sarcastic post: 1 month ban ” page.

Swiatek’s case follows a similar case involving top-ranked men’s Jannik Sinner.

Sinner tested positive for anabolic steroids twice in March but was not banned ITIA decision because the agency He decided that he was not guilty.

This has led some observers to claim a two-tier system; critics argued that it gave Sinner protection due to his leading actor status.

Earlier this month ATP Tour president Andrea Gaudenzi acknowledged this” communication could have been better ” while explaining the relevant rules Sinner’s doping caseHowever, he denied the allegations of double standards.

However, the decision to clear Sinner of wrongdoing was appealed by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in September.

WADA banned wanted Switzerland-based CAS is expected to make its final decision on the case in 2025.

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AP tennis: