Doping in Football

Hm. According to thje FIFA, the doping tests conducted before the start of the Confed Cup on all 23 players of each of the teams were negative.  

http://www.copa2014.gov.br/en/noticia/all-pre-fifa-confederations-cup-doping-controls-test-negative

During the event, one player from Tahiti was tested positiv, though.

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/soccer-dirty-tackle/unnamed-tahiti-player-failed-doping-test-confederations-cup-161732200.html

I haven't found any further info, I'm afraid.

sportsczy wrote:There are rumors out there that several key Brazil NT players were doped up for the confed cup... and are now paying the price as their bodies are reacting badly.  Namely, their immune systems have been greatly weakened and they've been getting sick.  Others are suffering from great fatigue post getting doped up.

Hope this isn't true.

Where did you hear this? Would appreciate a source, this is quite disturbing news.

It's not uncommon. I'd say 95% of players out there use HGH for recovery purposes... they keep designing new ones so that the drug tests can't find them. Basically, you need to stop 48 hours before competition so that the body gets rid of the buildup and it doesn't register on the tests. You maintain the benefits, however, for several weeks. Until doping occurs randomly including off season and time off, you're always going to be behind.

They were discussing the issue i mentioned on L'Equipe 21 with a roundtable of pundits in France. Apparently, the use of these drugs is rampant.

The problem is that "It's not uncommon" unfortunately isn't evidence.

On the other hand, I'm pretty sure the FAs and other sports organisations will very likely do anything to keep things under wraps (see that recent doping study in Germany that was held back quite a while on dubious grounds as it does implicate that even the government parties of the time the study covers seem to have known at least about parts of the proceedings).

You won't get proof unless you have random year round testing done by an unaffiliated 3rd party using state of the art procedures.  

The IOC has approved sever measures that take effect start of 2015:  If any athlete in an Olympic sport is caught using steroids, it's a 4 year ban on the first offense.  Any subsequent offense and it's a lifetime ban.

You have to make the penalties so ridiculously severe that athletes don't want to take the risk.

In professional baseball in the US, it's getting very severe too.  First offense and it's 50 games (1/3 of the season), second offense and it's a full season...  3rd offense and you're done forever.  They're also talking about making it even more severe.  They just banned 13 players yday, including Alex Rodriguez, one of the greatest players ever.  Arod got suspended through the end of next season.  

Football is light year behind many sports unfortunately.

Also, when you hear several reliable reporters talk about the problem being rampant without naming sources... they're protecting their sources.  But you better believe that it's happening.

I didn't want to imply that I didn't believe you, the problem is unfortunately that there seem to be quite some higher ups involved in obfuscating everything that is going on.

Well, the German study I mentioned doesn't give names either, although it is rumoured there are numerous athletes, officials, doctors and even politicians involved. The scientists who conducted the study started that in West Germany we had "systemic doping", while in East Germany, it was "systematic doping" - the difference being that in the east the athletes weren't asked when given performance enhancing substances, no matter the risks, while in the west it was the voluntary decision of the athletes whether they wanted to take the stuff or not.

Yeah... This is something Interpol needs to get involved in for it to get somewhere.

Gambling, drugs and bribes. Football is big business and it has a big underworld. Going to be tough to get things fixed.

Personally, i think they should legalize some of the HGH and PED drugs that are proven to have no side effects. Sure, they enhance performance. But if everyone is enhancing and there's little to no side effect, the playing field is not uneven as a result.

Need to get the war to a manageable scope.

Problem is the "little to no side effects"  - especially when using hormones you never have only little side effects as the balance of the body metabolism gets upset, no matter how careful you go about it. HGH isn't as harmless as the athletes would hope. The known side effects (I have access to the full medical info of prescriptive drugs at the rote-liste.de) include leucemia, diabetes mellitus, inter cranial hypertension, dysfunctions of endocrine glands and "rare cases of sudden death", among other things. Moreover, the substance acts directly on liver and kidneys, and it can accelerate tumor growth.

A drug like erythropoetin that enhances the production of red blood cells, also increases the haematocrit, which is the amount of solid substances in the blood. The effect of this is a high tendency to blood clotting which then can lead to thromboses, strokes, infarctions, embolism, depending on where the blood clots form.

I think the better way is really to ban these drugs as legalizing them would be only beneficial for people who don't give a damn about their health, while athletes who don't want to risk all these side effects will not be competitive anymore.

sportsczy wrote:Yeah... This is something Interpol needs to get involved in for it to get somewhere.  

Gambling, drugs and bribes.  Football is big business and it has a big underworld.  Going to be tough to get things fixed.

Personally, i think they should legalize some of the HGH and PED drugs that are proven to have no side effects.  Sure, they enhance performance.  But if everyone is enhancing and there's little to no side effect, the playing field is not uneven as a result.

Need to get the war to a manageable scope.

Spain unfortunately made themselves a prime suspect. Spanish sports suddenly climaxing at the same time the last couple of years hmmm
Just sad to hide the truth like that. Why hide something that is clean?

 unrelated to the thread but ive been told that HGH cream is legal in USA and its not in canada , is it?

IL Gladiatore wrote: unrelated to the thread but ive been told that HGH cream is legal in USA and its not in canada , is it?

Well, there are different laws in different countries, and drugs that are legal in one country don't need to be that in another country. Some freely available meds in one country might not have a marketing authorisation of pharmaceuticals in another country, so they would be illegal there.

An example would for example be the anticoagulants phenprocoumon (widely used in Europe) vs warfarin (widely used in the US). In Austria or Switzerland, warfarin has no marketing authorisation as it is considered too dangerous (teratogenic, heavy other side effects), while in the US this doesn't seem to be considered a problem.

The 53-year-old German, who played for Barcelona and Real Madrid in the 1980s, said doping was not an issue when he was a player “because the word, as we know it today, didn’t exist. We all took something. No stimulants in the classical sense”.

He added: “But the doctors and physiotherapists always gave you some kinds of things, sometimes even on the mornings of games, when you didn’t feel well somehow or you were in a bit of pain.

“You didn’t ask what you were ­getting"

How did he get this out without the Spanish government stopping him?