{"id":406052,"date":"2024-06-25T00:51:42","date_gmt":"2024-06-25T00:51:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=406052"},"modified":"2024-06-25T02:05:15","modified_gmt":"2024-06-25T02:05:15","slug":"not-right-banned-players-dads-reply-to-drug-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=406052","title":{"rendered":"'Not right': Banned player's dad's reply to drug report"},"content":{"rendered":"

T\ufeffhe father of banned Demons<\/a> player Joel Smith has again implored the AFL<\/a> to revamp its illicit drugs policy and outsource the job to an independent body.<\/p>\n

His comments came the morning after Sports Integrity Australia (SIA) released findings of a report following investigations into bombshell claims in federal parliament by MP Andrew Wilkie<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It was in March when Wilkie used parliamentary privilege to accuse the AFL and its clubs of operating an off-the-books drug testing scheme, which allowed players to avoid game-day tests and possible punishment under the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code.<\/p>\n

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\ufeffOn advice from a former Melbourne Demons doctor, Wilkie alleged players were being secretly tested during the week and if they tested positive to a banned substance, were advised to fake an injury or illness so they couldn't be tested on game day.<\/p>\n

The SIA report on Monday found no evidence to support those allegations.\ufeff<\/p>\n

\"Banned<\/p>\n

The AFL has maintained its drugs policy is focused on dissuading players from taking illicit drugs – including recreational substances – rather than punishing them and the their teams through suspensions.<\/p>\n

Smith is a rare case of an AFL player being banned for drugs charges.<\/p>\n

\ufeffSmith tested positive to cocaine on game day in August<\/a>. Following an investigation he was subsequently served three additional Ant-Doping Rule Violations by SIA in February<\/a> for alleged "trafficking or attempted trafficking" of cocaine to third parties.<\/p>\n

In an anti-doping context, trafficking may include an athlete "selling, delivering or distributing" any prohibited substance. The allegations are not criminal in nature.<\/p>\n

His father Shaun – a former first grade footballer himself – has been steadfast in his belief Joel has been made a scapegoat for a wider problem within the league.<\/p>\n

"There is commentary out there saying he is an isolated incident and all this, which is just not correct," Shaun Smith told Today<\/em> in a new interview on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

"(Drug use is) rife through society, the AFL has a big problem and they've obviously been doing everything they can to cover it up with off-the-books testing.<\/p>\n

\"MP<\/p>\n

"What I think the AFL needs to do is scrap the whole (drugs policy) and start again. It's obviously not working, it is tainted with lots of non-transparency.<\/p>\n

"They need to start again and get an outside independent person to do it, not do it in-house.\ufeff"<\/p>\n

Shaun Smith was still grappling with the SIA findings that there had been no wrongdoing from the AFL or its clubs.<\/p>\n

"I'm still trying to process it at the moment," he said.<\/p>\n

"The AFL got away with a bit of a loophole in testing, it wasn't done on game day, and it doesn't seem they've intervened with the rules of the anti-doping.<\/p>\n

"To me that's not right. They came out a while ago and said the are unapologetic about doing the testing themselves, which I found astounding.\ufeff"<\/p>\n

Joel Smith has been provisionally suspended and is yet to \ufeffreturn to the Demons since his positive test.<\/p>\n

The AFL has committed to releasing an updated drugs policy this year.\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

T\ufeffhe father of banned Demons player Joel Smith has again implored the AFL to revamp its illicit drugs policy and outsource the job to an […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":406054,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406052"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=406052"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":406057,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406052\/revisions\/406057"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/406054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=406052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=406052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=406052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}