SkippyTiger wrote: Refusal to submit to a non-WADA drug test is not grounds for dismissal.
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No it isn't. But they were not dismissed. They quit.
I'm well aware of that as stated in the paragraphs you didn't quote.
My point was that the players will state that they could not be dismissed as they had broken no rules, so were instead forced to quit by the club, thus paving the way for a constructive dismissal suit.
Without doubt those involved have brought the game into very serious disrepute. I would have hoped that the issues involved could have been resolved quietly within Bath Rugby Club. It would appear not.
So let the full spotlight of RFU and IRB swiftly illuminate and their disciplinary laser purge the game of this cancer.
I do not care about collateral damage, or innocent victims.
It must be put to death, stamped out, quickly, violently if necessary.
The opinion expressed above is that of the author and does not imply any acceptance of it by Leicester Football Club PLC or their agents who in no way share responsibility with the author for its publication.
It would be interesting to find out who asked the players to submit to testing.
From the RFU anti doping document
Out of Competition Testing
(a) Under the Board's Anti-Doping Out of Competition programme the
Board may select any Player under membership of a Union to
undergo Testing at any time or place.
(b) The Board may appoint a Sample collection agency to conduct Out
of Competition Testing on behalf of the IRB.
REGULATION 21 SCHEDULE 1
303
(c) Such Testing may be conducted unannounced or by way of an
appointment made with a Player in advance by either an authorised
Doping Control Official or a representative of the Board.
(d) Out of Competition testing may take place during a Rugby Football
season or out-of-season and may occur at a training ground,
residential accommodation or any other place where the Player is
likely to be found.
(e) Players and/or Unions on request from the Board will be required to
provide Players whereabouts details which may consist of personal
and club training details along with National Squad/Team training
sessions so that effective Out of Competition testing can be
conducted.
From that it appears that the club does not request or perform the tests. Unless I suppose that there is a clause in their contracts.
Can the club inform the board that they suspect an offence has taken place and then the test be requested throught the appropriate channels?
Note also
Anti-Doping Rule Violations
Doping in sport is no longer just about the Use of a Prohibited Substance or Method. The following are Anti-Doping Rule Violations under iRB Regulation 21:
1. The presence of a Prohibited Substance in a players bodily sample
2. Use or attempted use of a Prohibited Substance or Method
3. Refusing to comply with a request to provide a sample or otherwise evading sample collection
4. Failure to provide required whereabouts information and missed tests
5. Tampering or attempting to tamper with any part of the doping control process
6. Possession of a Prohibited Substance or Method
7. Trafficking of a Prohibited Substance or Method
8. Administration or attempted administration of a Prohibited Substance or Method to any player, or assisting, encouraging, aiding, abetting, covering up or any other type of complicity involving an anti-doping rule violation.
Sanctions
There are strict sanctions for any player who is found to have committed one of the above doping offences. In the majority of cases a first time doping offence will carry a minimum ban of two (2) years with lifetime bans for second offences.
Support personnel such as managers, doctors, coaches and conditioners should also be aware that iRB Regulation 21 and these Anti-Doping Rule Violations may apply to them. Support personnel found guilty of the administration or trafficking of Prohibited Substances face a minimum ban of four (4) years.
I can't see how this can end well for any of the parties now. Legal action costs benefit no-one other than the lawyers. I would imagine any players nearing the end of their contracts or potential recruits would think twice before signing.
I can't see this helping with their efforts to convince the local authorities to allow them to extend their ground either.
Players are heavier & faster than the past.
Some is down to training & the fact that average heights are increasing as children are better fed & healthier than their ancestors.
However I doubt it all can be put down to conditioning & the time has come for rugby union to put down a marker and insist that all countries adopt a much more stringent approach to in & out of season testing.
I'm not suggesting any clubs condone drug use but until they actively look for it the pressure will remain on players to be competitive.
Coke may not enhance performance but would you want to tackle an 18 stone prop with his perception of reality & pain on a low orbit of Pluto? No thanks.
jgriffin wrote:The biggest disappointment to me is that out-of-season testing is not instituted. This is when considerable drug abuse can take place, not of the recreational variety, but anabolic or growth preparations, and their associated masking agents. These enable considerable training loads to be undertaken as they massively shorten recovery periods. This is routine in some sports (see RL for sports details and TV wrestling for extreme manifestations) and manifests itself as severe connective tissue injuries in season, severe muscle tears and unexplained deaths from heart failure.
Out of season testing is instituted, from the GP rules and regulations
"In season 2006/07 a total of 414 tests were carried out on rugby players in England under the RFU’s testing programme, with over 50% conducted out of competition with no advance notice."
Tigers & Bath games are always special & hopefully will be so in the future, So lets not add to the media hype around this sad situation.
As true rugby supporters we know that the media do wring out every word, rumour as much as possible.
So lets review by all means everything thats made available but at the same time make no judgements on Players, Club or Rugby as a whole until all the facts are out.
tigerfeet13 wrote:It would be interesting to find out who asked the players to submit to testing.
It was the Bath club that asked the players to submit to testing as an internal matter. From what I can gather the club has a clause in the players' contracts that allows them to request testing in addition to any standard testing performed under anti-doping laws while the season is in progress. The players stated that the season was over and refused to provide samples as it was outside their contractual obligations. The Regs you posted only cover testing required by the IRB and Anti-doping agencys who are not involved at all currently.
As I have said on a previous post - .........................IF this was true, that it was common knowledge in the rugby fraternity, the the real question should be what were Bath doing about it? Were the ignoring it and hoping it would go away and then caught out by a fracas in a night club? Or were they doing something about it in terms of testing? If the latter were the case, is it the results or non results (ie they didn't turn up ) that has led them down this course of events.
Either way I will not be gloating about anything I feel very sorry for the Bath supporters. People pay a lot of hard earned cash to be season ticket holders and support teams and the way players behave is a direct impact on the product you pay to see.
If a player takes a performancing enhancing drug then he cheats the whole sport, other clubs, supporters, his own team mates (especially if he gets game time at the expense of others) - If on the other hand he takes recreational drugs - he again let's down team mates and supporters - can you imagine how it would be to think that your team may have reached a final or won a trophy if players had not been taking illegal substances (like stevens did).
I feel for the supporters - If it happened in our club and they dragged their heels in any way cleaning it up then I would never pay a penny piece to watch them again I can assure you of that.
The action needs to be swift, fair and if guilty ..Harsh! Clear it out root and branch, we do not want the farce in rugby union that you have in athletics or the chimpanzees running the zoo like they have in football.
Mol2 makes an interesting point. On Yahoo sports Backy, in his regular column, suggests that drug abuse is not widespread and a number of posters on this thread express the hope that nobody at Leicester is tempted down this road. I agree with those that say there should more routine off-season testing. The thing is though, as players get bigger and faster and fitter, so the physical demands grow. In addition, the growth of modern rugby - with the Guinness Premiership, the HEC, Anglo/Welsh Cup, autumn internationals, 6 Nations, summer tours, Lions, World Cup etc - puts huge demands on players who need to play at levels of intensity that their amateur predecessors simply could never have maintained. When do these players get to have a rest? And let's not forget that, unlike their amateur predecessors, many modern players don't have a job to fall back on when their playing days are over. When the injuries start to pile up in the mid-20s and playing days start to look numbered, it must take some will power to avoid taking a few 'short cuts' to ensure a few more years at the top on a decent wage. I don't have any answers here but I guess I'm saying that I'd be surprised if this wasn't the tip of the iceberg, maybe not with recreational drugs, but certainly with steroids.