Random drug testing procedure called into question

A seriously dehydrated Kerry footballer was detained by an Irish Sports Council drugs tester past midnight yesterday after being unable to provide a urine sample for over three hours.

As is the procedure, the player was randomly selected following Kerry’s training session in Austin Stack Park, Tralee on Tuesday evening.

However, he had to take on a large amount of liquids before eventually passing urine. Between arriving at training and leaving, the player spent almost six hours there.

“It was a joke,” said a source close to the player. “He didn’t sign any contract to commit to it. He’s not a professional. He had a job to go to the following morning.”

GAA director of games administration Feargal McGill yesterday sympathised with the player’s predicament.

However, he also emphasised the importance of the GAA’s commitment to the Irish Sports Council’s anti-doping controls.

“It’s not uncommon in our sport or most other sports,” said McGill. “The problem is when a player finds it difficult to pass urine.

“The bottom line is we’re committed to the anti-doping programme rolled out by the Irish Sports Council.

“We have great sympathy for players who find themselves in such situations. The procedure of providing a urine sample is not necessarily comfortable for most of them.

“However, it is one of the conditions laid out for the Government-funded grants for inter-county players and it has to be adhered to.”

The issue of GAA’s amateur players having to make themselves available for the same tests as professional sportsmen and women has been a thorny issue for the Association since the anti-doping tests were introduced to inter-county Gaelic games in 2001.

However, the ISC have made it clear Gaelic players must also be considered for testing if funding for the GAA and the inter-county players’ Government-funded grants scheme.

As part of their recently-inked official recognition protocol with the GAA, the Gaelic Players Association (GPA) have agreed to a strict adherence of the ISC’s anti-doping controls.

However, in 2008 they polled their members to seek approval to boycott drug tests. Part of the GPA’s reasoning behind the action was a threat to the inter-county players’ grants.

Kerry have had high-profile dealings with anti-doping testers before. Aidan O’Mahony was eventually found innocent after he registered a positive test following the 2008 All-Ireland final defeat to Tyrone.

O’Mahony’s sample was found to contain abnormal levels of salbutamol — a drug used to combat asthma, which O’Mahony suffers.

The GAA’s anti-doping committee ruled the levels of the substance found in his sample were “consistent with the inhalation of the substance” and he was cleared of any wrongdoing.

Last year 92 inter-county GAA players were tested with all of the tests returning a negative results for doping.

However, the latest development raises the issue of the procedures taking place before training sessions instead of after them when players will be dehydrated.