Drugs are high on the sporting agenda in Dublin today as the Director General of the World Anti-Doping Agency will be in town to launch the Sport Ireland Annual Anti-Doping review.
The world of sport has been rocked with increasing regularity and severity in recent years by scandals around how stars at the top of the game have cheated to stay there and been caught.
The greater story of course lies in those that are doing the same but have not yet been caught.
At the weekend the Sunday Times in the UK ran a front page ‘expose’ of a doctor in London who reportedly boasted of having supplied performance enhancing drugs to a range of athletes across a number of different sports.
That followed on the back of Maria Sharapova’s self admission of taking a drug which enhances recovery and therefore performance over a period of ten years. The realisation that her earnings from a single endorsement contract would exceed the entire annual budget for WADA is a depressing insight into the battle that has to take place between the forces of deception and detection.
We will report tomorrow morning on Ireland’s place within that battle and on the words that Howman will speak to calm frayed nerves about the integrity of sport in an overall context.
