Washington: Swiss ace Roger Federer has claimed tennis needs to do the most in the fight against doping, saying it would be naive to think the sport is clear of drugs cheats. The 17-time grand slam champion said naivety says that tennis is clean, the way it`s been all the way through, according to reports.
Federer added it`s pretty good, of course every sport always has some cases, but he thinks their sport needs to do the up most to try to make sure the integrity stays and that the fans don`t tune into different sports just because they don`t trust the players anymore.
Federer said he has always been fighting to make sure we have enough testing, and he suggested introducing a anti-doping system similar to the one used in cycling, where an athletes drug test results are kept over a period of time so that the use of a banned substance is more easily detected.
Novak Djokovic, currently the world`s top-ranked male tennis player, had claimed at January`s Australian Open that he had not been tested in the previous six months, and Federer called for increased funding and testing to ensure transparency.
Federer said more funding, more blood, more urine, you name it, and more funding all across the board. The 31-year old said maybe keep samples as well for a long period of time so you can go back and punish those players, adding the people, or the players, need to be scared if they cheat. Federer added of course some players do it by mistake, but unfortunately it falls into the same situation and you have to pay the price for it.
ANI
First Published: Saturday, March 02, 2013, 15:21