Sponsors hate having their names tarnished.
For example in the case of Losi Filipo, Wellington Rugby buckled
in part under threats sponsors would pull-out unless he was dumped.
One global sponsor that takes a hard-line on its athletes taking
drugs is Adidas.
The International
Association of Athletics Federation and Tyson Gay have recently had their
lucrative deals put through their Bavarian shredder.
So how will Kasper
Rorsted (CEO Adidas) be feeling as he thumbs through Das Spiegel to find All
Blacks lock Patrick Tuipulotu has reportedly been caught using a banned substance?
Read the initial story here.
What sort of drugs/chemical substances
we don’t know at this stage.
One would presume ‘performance
enhancing’ for example would be viewed in a very, very dim light.
Were Tuipulotu to be
found – these are only allegations at this stage – to be using a performance
enhancing substance as opposed to getting caught-out smoking a joint whilst listening to Pink Floyd, this has the potential to develop into a major embarrassing
issue for N.Z Rugby.
And they damn well
know it.
That’s why NZ Rugby and
’s local union. Auckland, have been plying the line since November that
he’s simply had an "on-going personal matter".
This from an entity
which brandishes the words ‘standards’ and
‘professionalism’ like confetti from Richie McCaws wedding.
What action will the
International Rugby Board take?
Protocols dictate
they know the moment any professional player tests positive even for recreational use.
Especially one
playing in the world’s top ranked team.
The World Rugby dot
org site is strangely silent?
Perhaps they were
trying to think of something more original than “on-going personal matter”?
But now the story has
broken.
This has legs, ten-times the size of Tuipulotu's.
It will now run and
run despite obvious attempts by N.Z Rugby to snuff-it-out and hide it in the
closet.
Steve Tew will be
forced to front the media today.
"Steve, when did you first know of this positive test?"
"Did Patrick play any games after the positive test was first reported?"
"What sort of banned substances are we talking here Steve? Recreational or performance enhancing?"
Don't think you'll get a straight answer to any of these pertinent questions.
Not right away.
But it will all come-out.
This comes close
after the failed Wellingtons Seven’s and my bet is Tew’s time is up.
Potentially this could be the most embarrassing thing to happen to N.Z Rugby in the professional era depending on what the banned substance was, when it was first discovered.
Tarnishing the All Black name forever.
Up-Date Friday 10th February: The B-Test for a
performance enhancing drug came in negative. Apparently 1 positive + 1 negative
= you are off the hook. I bet the cycling fraternity would look at this ‘benefit
of the doubt’ decision and shake their heads. Sure, mistakes can occur in the
testing process, but from the same sample? What are the chances? What exactly
was the drug involved? Something you could innocently acquire off the Chemist
shelf, or more nefarious akin to under-the-table body-building supplement? Kindly
point it out to us on the World Anti-Doping Agency's 2016 Prohibited List. Why call a
positive drug test ‘personal reasons’ when the next time an All Black has to
depart from a tour if say his child is sick, the public could think “that’s a
smoke-screen”? Why wait so long for the B Sample to be tested? Why, when the
news media askes these questions no-one can get a straight answer? One could feel they are hiding something were one was a nasty prick. Not me though.
