"People just think you’re like a robot": Kim Clijsters calls for human side consideration in dealing of doping cases after Jannik Sinner's verdict appeal

Former world number one Kim Clijsters believes the human side must be considered while dealing with doping cases. Doping protocols have been discussed in the recent past after reports emerged that world number one Jannik Sinner tested positive for the banned substance clostebol in two tests.

The Italian tennis star surprisingly managed to escape a ban after the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), in a detailed statement, announced that they accepted the player’s counsel’s response, which claimed that the banned substance was present in minimal quantity in the player’s sample because a member of the coaching staff had given the player a cream to treat an injury.

The decision received widespread criticism from a section of the tennis community, including some former and current players, who demanded similar treatment from all players involved in such cases. On Saturday, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) announced that they have appealed against the verdict in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and demanded a one or two years suspension. Former women’s world number one Clijsters was recently quoted in a report where she demanded that the human side must be considered in such cases.

“I think that my first kind of feeling and an opinion about it is that it sounds very harsh but again, this is how I also felt with Simona [Halep],” she said. “I think the rule, like you described it, you have 48 hours to find what the issue is but then to me there's also. I was always very cautious but you have to understand, think about putting myself in that situation, I’m not in control of what my trainer would have done. There’s so many things, like we’ve had players that tested positive because they ate a steak in South America. Like try to rewind, that’s kind of where did that come from and so if there’s so many ways and routes that this all can go and not one case is the same. I do think that there needs to be an understanding for situations. I’m sure there have been and there are probably players who were doing things wrong and they will get caught. But when it is in situations like the ones that we've mentioned, I do feel like the human side of it needs to be addressed, like what does this do to Jannik's mental state of mind. People just think you’re like a robot and you go out there playing and everything seems fine and to me, I also feel like they are not taken into consideration enough.”