Halep back on tennis court after four-year doping ban slashed to nine months

Former Grand Slam tennis champion Simona Halep has seen her four-year doping ban slashed to just nine months.

The new, backdated ban means the Romanian is able to resume competition immediately.

The 32-year-old appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport after she was banned for testing positive for roxadustat, an anti-anaemia drug.

Her appeal was partially upheld with Cas ruling she’d unintentionally taken the drug “on the balance of probabilities”

Halep call overturned

“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,” it said.

“The roxadustat, as detected in her sample, came from that contaminated product.

“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 backdated nine-month ban expired on 6 July, 2023 having been charged with two offences by the International Tennis Integrity Agency in October 2022.

She could return to the WTA Tour as soon as this month.