Tennis player Simona Halep will be heard by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (TAS), between February 7-9, in her trial against the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), according to Agerpres.
Simona Halep, PHOTO Getty
It is about the appeal filed by the former world number 1 and winner of two Grand Slam tournaments regarding his four-year suspension for doping, in which the ITIA decision is requested to be annulled and the sanction reduced. The stakes of this approach are very high for Simona Halep, because, as TAS states, “the decision of the Court of Arbitration for Sport will be final and unassailable, except for the right of the parties to appeal to the Swiss Federal Court, within 30 days”.
Simona Halep's hearing will take place behind closed doors
Through a statement issued on Tuesday, TAS informed that the hearing of the tennis player, the parties, witnesses and experts will be held in Lausanne, either in person or by videoconference.
Also, “since neither party requested a public hearing”, the procedure will take place behind closed doors, starting from Wednesday, from 10:30 (Romanian time), until Friday, approximately at 16:30 (Romanian time). As for the sentence, this “will be pronounced at an as yet unknown date”,
specifies TAS.
In September 2023, the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) announced that Simona Halep was suspended for a period of four years for doping and that she had twice violated the Tennis Anti-Doping Program (TADP) regulations.
The first violation of the regulation refers to the identification of the banned substance roxadustat in her body, following an anti-doping test during the US Open 2022 competition, and the second is related to the irregularities in her biological passport (ABP).
The independent tribunal, established by Sport Resolutions, met on June 28 and 29, 2023, in London and heard experts in the field, who testified in favor of the Romanian, who also spoke before the tribunal, according to the ITIA press release.
Simona Halep's argument that she took contaminated food supplements was initially accepted, but it was later determined that the volume ingested by the athlete could not have such a high concentration of roxadustat as that identified in the positive sample. As a result, the court decided that the player committed “intentional violations” of the Anti-Doping Regulation.
Also then, the second charge was upheld, the court maintaining that there were no reasons to doubt “strong opinion”, unanimous, of the three independent experts (APMU), who considered that “probably doping” is the explanation for the irregularities in the athlete's biological passport.
Simona Halep has been provisionally suspended since October 2022, so that she can no longer participate in official competitions until October 6, 2026. Her hopes are now linked to the hearings at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne.
