Simona Halep's chances of a successful appeal against her four-year doping ban have been cast into doubt by the former president of the Romanian Tennis Federation Ion Tiriac, who says he does not trust the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Three-time Grand Slam champion Halep was provisionally suspended after she tested positive for the banned substance roxadustat at the 2022 US Open. She then received a second doping charge earlier this year due to irregularities in her Athlete Biological Passport (ABP).
After multiple delays, a tribunal was held in London over the summer, where the 32-year-old was found guilty and hit with a four-year ban. The verdict has been met with mixed reactions from the tennis community but Halep has continued to maintain her innocence and confirmed that she will appeal her case to CAS (also known as TAS - Tribunal Arbitral du Sport).
Tiriac says CAS "break[s] all the rules"
However, Tiriac, who has also worked as a coach for the likes of Boris Becker, Guillermo Vilas, and Ilie Nastase, displayed mistrust of the international body and predicted disappointment for Halep and her team. The 84-year-old used the example of retired Romanian gymnast Andrea Raducan in his explanation.
"I don’t know what Simona is doing, now she goes to TAS. But does the world know what TAS is? In 2000, Andrea Răducan’s sample was manipulated, they sent 62 ml and returned 100 ml. What does TAS do? Break all the rules. So what world are we living in?
"Well, after a year someone comes and says that he dug and found something else, the biological passport. Well, you checked it 380 times in 10 years and you didn’t find… And then it’s a job that isn’t clean somewhere.
"Now Simona is going to TAS, with what hopes, I don’t know. I understand she went with some lawyers from Los Angeles. I don’t know them, but I wish them all the best from the bottom of my heart," he said.
The former World No. 19 also stressed that he believed Halep was innocent.
"We Romanians are a nation where you feel like crying sometimes. This girl won Wimbledon for this country. Well, if you win Wimbledon, you are the hero of the world. And now we’ve all forgotten that she won at Wimbledon? Why, because someone gave him apple or pear compote to drink?
"But Simona Halep, doped? Are you crazy? [...] So for me she remains a great, great personality, not just an athlete," he continued.
