Preferential treatment for Jannik Sinner? Certainly not. Andrea Gaudenzi, boss of the AFP, estimated on Friday that the doping affair in which the world No. 1 has been entangled since the summer of 2024 had been managed “in the rules of the art“. “I am 100% sure there was no preferential treatment“, said the president of the ATP, which manages the men’s professional circuit, in an interview with the Australian news agency AAP.
“The procedure was conducted according to the rules of the art and in accordance with the regulations of the International Tennis Integrity Agency (Itia)”, insisted the Italian. Testing positive for clostebol (an anabolic) in March, Sinner did not receive any suspension and only saw his case revealed in the summer of 2024 by Itia .
At the end of December, Novak Djokovic regretted the lack of “transparency and inconsistency of protocols“, pointing out that other players caught in doping cases were waiting”more than a year since their case was resolved“.
The World Anti-Doping Agency, also dissatisfied, appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and demands a suspension of one to two years for Sinner, who is about to begin the defense of his title at the Open d ‘Australia.
There was a lot of false information
If Djokovic, winner of 24 Grand Slam tournaments, said he believed Sinner when he claimed to have tested positive for clostebol following contamination by his physiotherapist, he claimed to have “was very frustrated, like most other players, to have been kept in the dark for five months“.
Sinner “received the news (of the positive tests) in April and the announcement was not made until August, just before the US Open. The ATP hasn’t really spoken in depth about why they kept this matter out of the public eye“, he lamented.
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Video credit: Eurosport
For Andrea Gaudenzi, “there was a lot of false information“. The ATP boss says he only learned of Sinner’s doping affair.”two days before the Itia announcement – as it should be“.
“I was a little shocked at first. (But Itia) is completely independent and it turned to an independent tribunal“to make his decision, he insisted. Even if Sinner was suspended, “I think he will survive and we will survive. Tennis is a very solid product“, he concluded.
