Andy has been writing about the governance of sport for over 15 years. Prior to working on the Sports Integrity Initiative, he was the editor of World Sports Law Report for eight years. He has also worked for the Press Association and has written for numerous trade magazines. He has also created, chaired and spoken at numerous conferences on the business of sport, and produced the Sports Law Show for iSportConnect TV.
All posts by Andy Brown
International sporting federations will be free to set their own rules regarding gender in sport, after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) released its Framework Guidelines on Gender Identity today. At a media conference this evening, the IOC confirmed that while the Guidelines are intended to educate international federations towards...
Five athletes from four countries, competing in five sports, were involved in anti-doping proceedings this week. Only one of them appears to be a genuine case of cheating. The case of Teddy Atine-Venel brought the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) limits on inhaled salbutamol back into the spotlight. The...
The Badminton World Federation (BWF) has sanctioned Chinese players Jun Hao and Bin Rong with two year bans for conspiring to fix a 2019 mixed doubles match. On 20 March 2019, sports betting monitoring company ESSA notified the BWF that a sports betting company had identified ‘abnormal activity’ connected...
France’s 4x400m team, which finished eighth in the 4x400m final at the London 2017 World Athletics championships, is likely to be disqualified after a team member was sanctioned for an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV). Teddy Atine-Venel returned an adverse analytical finding (AAF) for salbutamol at the French Championships on...
• Richard Freeman’s appeal against a Decision by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) to strike him off the medical register has been adjourned until a later date, reports Cycling Weekly. The former British Cycling and Team Sky doctor was found guilty of ordering Testogel which he knew or...
Several Dutch footballers placed bets through a website which Dutch prosecutors allege was controlled by criminals, reports De Telegraaf. The newspaper reports that the EdoBet.com website, which is no longer live, was set up by Freddy S., the son of suspected international drug trafficker Piet S. It is understood...
Six athletes from four countries competing in four sports were involved in anti-doping proceedings this week, excluding the strange case of Franconia, a British horse that tested positive due to a human staff member’s recreational use of horse tranquilliser. The major news is that former professional cyclist Pirmin Lang,...
• A Russian middle distance runner and a ‘Koresh’ belt wrestler have been sanctioned for anti-doping rule violations, the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) announced. Anastasia Bragina (Анастасию Брагину) has been sanctioned with a four year ban expiring on 23 July 2025; and Zarif Valitov (Зарифа Валитова) has been sanctioned...
If an electoral candidate gave you a watch worth £30 ahead of an election in which you were due to vote, would you consider it a bribe? How about if the watch was worth £86, or £145? This week, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) disagreed with World...
Pirmin Lang, the former professional cyclist who confessed to being part of the ‘Operation Aderlass’ blood doping network orchestrated by Dr. Mark Schmidt, has been sanctioned with a backdated 18 month ban that expired on 19 August this year. ‘As part of the extensive investigations, Pirmin Lang made an...
Recreational use of ketamine by a stable staff member caused Franconia to test positive for the horse tranquilliser after it won the 2020 Abingdon Stakes at Newbury, a British Horseracing Authority (BHA) Decision reveals. The staff member admitted ‘occasional recreational use’ of ketamine, and to storing the drug in...
• Olga Vorobyova (Ольга Воробьева) has been sanctioned with a two year ban from 18 December 2020 for an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV), the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) announced. Vorobyova is a forward with Enisey (ЖБК Енисей) in Russia’s Basketball Premier League, and returned an adverse analytical finding (AAF...
India’s national anti-doping agency (NADA India) reported 79 adverse analytical findings (AAFs – or ‘positive tests’) during 2020/21, 17.9% of the 442 samples it collected during the period from April 2020 to March 2021. This percentage of positive tests is far higher than figures reported by other national anti-doping...
Just three athletes from two countries, competing in two sports were involved in anti-doping proceedings this week, which was the quietest since we launched the Anti-Doping Monitor. However, the circumstances behind all three cases are interesting. The International Testing Agency (ITA) investigated a 2012 sample provided by weightlifter Rodion...
Exactly a year after the Founders of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) dismissed Yuriy Ganus (Ю́рий Га́нус) as Director General, it was announced that an ‘open competition’ would be held for his replacement. Mikhail Bukhanov (Михаил Буханов) was the temporary replacement appointed by those same Founders a year ago. ...
