Simona Halep has been cleared to make an immediate return to tennis after the court of arbitration for sport (CAS) reduced her four-year doping ban to nine months.
The former world No 1 has not played since losing in the opening round of the 2022 US Open, where she tested positive for Roxadustat, an oral medication used to treat anaemia.
Halep was subsequently banned by the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), which initially charged her with using a prohibited substance and later identified irregularities in her athlete biological passport, essentially a compilation of blood samples taken over time that are tested for changes indicative of doping.
However, a CAS appeal panel ruled that “on the balance of probabilities” Halep was not guilty of intentional doping, accepting her argument that the positive test was caused by the ingestion of a contaminated collagen supplement called Keto MCT. While the panel found that the Romanian “did bear some level of fault or negligence for her violations, as she did not exercise sufficient care” when using the supplement, it concluded that she was not guilty of “significant fault or negligence”.
The allegations relating to Halep’s biological passport were dismissed by CAS, the panel concluding they were “not comfortably satisfied” that “likely doping” was to blame, as the ITIA had claimed. Halep, who has protested her innocence from the outset, hailed a “just decision” and branded the accusations levelled at her “scandalous”.
“Throughout this long and difficult process, I have maintained my belief that the truth would eventually come out, and that a just decision would be reached, because I am and always have been a clean athlete,” said the 32-year-old in a statement.
“My faith in the process was tested by the scandalous accusations that were levelled against me, and by the seemingly unlimited resources that were aligned against me. But in the end, the truth prevailed, even if it took much longer than I wish it had. I cannot wait to return to the tour.”
The decision leaves Halep, whose revised nine-month ban ended last July, free to resume a career that looked to be over when the ITIA issued her with a ban lasting until October 2026. Social media updates suggest she has been training regularly and, while her prolonged absence from the game means she no longer holds a world ranking, there should be no shortage of wild card offers for the former Wimbledon and French Open champion.
“Having carefully considered all the evidence put before it, the CAS panel determined that Ms Halep had established, on the balance of probabilities, that the Roxadustat entered her body through the consumption of a contaminated supplement which she had used in the days shortly before 29 August 2022 and that the Roxadustat, as detected in her sample, came from that contaminated product,” read a CAS statement.
“As a result, the CAS panel determined that Ms Halep had also established, on the balance of probabilities, that her anti-doping rule violations were not intentional.
“Although the CAS panel found that Ms Halep did bear some level of fault or negligence for her violations, as she did not exercise sufficient care when using the Keto MCT supplement, it concluded that she bore no significant fault or negligence.”
The panel’s findings were published in a two-page summary intended to let Halep make a swift return to the court following 18 months in exile. A full explanation of the reasoning behind the verdict will follow. For now, though, the ITIA is left contemplating a wholesale rebuttal of its contention that the level of Roxadustat in Halep’s system was too great to be accidental, as well as an order to pay 20,000 Swiss francs towards the Romanian’s legal fees.
“An essential element of the anti-doping process is a player’s ability to appeal, and the ITIA respects both their right to do so, and the outcome,” said Karen Moorhouse, the ITIA’s chief executive officer.