World No. 1 men’s tennis player Jannik Sinner has been given an anti-doping sanction after testing positive twice for a banned substance. An independent tribunal ruled that Sinner bore “no fault or negligence” for both positive tests, but Sinner has been stripped of his ranking points, prize money and results from the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells in March.
A test during that tournament on March 10, 2024, detected an adverse analytical finding (AAF) for clostebol, a prohibited anabolic steroid that is a non-specified substance on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) prohibited list. A second test, conducted out of competition on March 18, also detected a metabolite of clostebol.
The first sample was recorded at 76 pg (picograms) per milliliter. The second was recorded at 86 pg per milliliter. One picogram is equal to one trillionth of a gram.
The standard penalty if a player is found guilty of such an offence is a four-year ban.
As an unspecified substance, an AAF for clostebol carries a mandatory provisional suspension from tennis. Sinner appealed both of those suspensions and was thus allowed to continue playing and reaching the top of the tennis world while the investigation into whether he intentionally used the banned substance unfolded. He won the Cincinnati Masters title on Monday.
An independent court appointed by Sport Resolutions, a private agency that regularly handles doping cases, has approved the lifting of both suspensions.
The International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) investigation concluded with a hearing, also overseen by Sport Resolutions, on August 15. At that hearing, an independent tribunal found Sinner to have committed “no fault or negligence” for the two Tennis Anti-Doping Program (TADP) violations. The Italian admitted both violations and can continue to play as he has since the tests were conducted.
In separate announcements Tuesday, ITIA and Sinner’s team said the Italian had tested positive for low levels of the anabolic steroid, which was once used as part of East Germany’s notorious state-sponsored doping regime in the 1960s and 1970s.
Sinner’s team and the ITIA stated that he fully cooperated with the investigation.
The ITIA investigation concluded that an over-the-counter healing spray containing clostebol was brought to Indian Wells by Sinner’s physical therapist, Umberto Ferrara. Ferrara purchased the spray, under the brand name Trofodermin, in February.
Sinner’s physiotherapist, Giacomo Naldi, then cut himself with a scalpel he was using to treat calluses on Sinner’s feet during the tournament. Naldi used the spray to treat the cut and, according to the full court ruling, “did not check the contents of the spray and did not see that the label on the can said ‘clostebol.'”
The physiotherapist then performed massages and treatments on Sinner between March 5 and March 13. According to the statement from Sinner’s team, “the physiotherapist treated Jannik and his lack of care combined with several open wounds on Jannik’s body caused the infection.”
In the full decision published by ITIA, Professor David Cowan, a scientific expert commissioned to assess Sinner’s testimony, comments on the levels of clostebol found in Sinner’s samples.
“Even if the administration had been intentional, the small amounts likely administered would not have been so serious. […] any relevant doping or performance enhancing effect on the player.”
Sinner lost to Carlos Alcaraz in the Indian Wells semifinals and only learned of the positive test in April — after winning the Miami Open. He was provisionally suspended between April 4-5 and April 17-20, according to the full court decision published Tuesday by the ITIA.
“I am now putting this very challenging and extremely unfortunate period behind me,” Sinner said.
“I will continue to do everything I can to ensure that I remain compliant with the ITIA Anti-Doping Programme and I have a team around me who are diligent in their own compliance.”
Sinner loses 400 ranking points to Indian Wells (George Walker/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Clostebol, considered a weak steroid compared to other performance enhancing drugs, can help build muscle and aid in the recovery process after intense training, allowing athletes to train harder. It can also be found in various therapeutic creams that are available over the counter in different countries.
Jamie Singer, a lawyer for Sinner, described the Italian as yet another athlete who has been the victim of his team’s mistakes. He said the ITIA had not challenged his claim of innocence in relation to the deliberate use of a banned substance.
“Under the rules, he is responsible for the mistakes of his teammates and unfortunately those mistakes led to the positive test,” Singer said.
Italian tennis players have previously tested positive for clostebol. Matilde Paoletti and Mariano Tammaro, both 17 at the time, tested positive in 2021 when anti-doping was under the jurisdiction of the International Tennis Federation (ITF), according to a report in Fair sport.
Both players were given mandatory provisional suspensions because their results were AAFs. Neither player had or has even come close to the notoriety of Sinner, whose testing came in the weeks following a ruling against the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s (CAS) ITIA in tennis’s most high-profile anti-doping case, that of former Grand Slam champion Simona Halep.
The ITIA had requested a six-year ban against the Romanian, after she was provisionally suspended in October 2022 after testing positive for roxadustat.
Halep returned to the tour in Miami in 2024 (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
Halep argued she inadvertently ingested it via a tainted supplement recommended by her coaching team, including Patrick Mouratoglou. CAS ruled that “on the balance of probabilities” Halep’s anti-doping violations were “not intentional.” It reduced her four-year ban to nine months — about half the time she had already served following her provisional suspension.
The Halep case led to widespread demands for reform from players and tennis officials, as well as criticism of the ITIA’s lengthy investigation. Halep’s former coach, Darren Cahill, who now coaches Sinner, called for an end to “false accusations and false narratives” surrounding Halep’s case in a since-deleted post on X in March.
The ITIA conducts approximately 2,500 tests on tennis players of various levels and ages each quarter, although higher-ranked players are tested most frequently. The tests take place during tournaments and outside of competition, with players required to provide their exact whereabouts for one hour each day so that the ITIA can subject them to random blood and urine tests.
(Top photo: Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
