When Maria Sharapova admitted earlier this week that she had failed a drug test at the Australian Open, she hoped her explanation—that she didn’t know a drug she had used for a decade was recently banned—would garner a lenient sentence and support from the tennis community.
As more details have emerged, though, it’s clear that the 28-year-old Sharapova is facing the most difficult challenge of her career, against both anti-doping authorities and the so-far unsympathetic opinions of her colleagues on the tennis tour.
Sharapova said she had taken Mildronate, the brand name of a Latvian-made cardiac drug called meldonium, since 2006. She said her family doctor recommended it because of recurring illnesses, low magnesium, irregular electrocardiogram results and a family history of diabetes.
“I made a huge mistake,” Sharapova said in a press conference in Los Angeles on Monday. “I have to take full responsibility for it because it’s my body.”
Meldonium was on the World Anti-Doping Agency’s watch list last year and banned as of Jan. 1 of this year after studies suggested it could enhance performance. The ban was first announced last September. In a Facebook letter posted Friday to her fans, Sharapova said that the Dec. 18 notification she received about changes to the doping code was buried inside an email. “I think most people would call it too hard to find,” she said. She tested positive for meldonium after losing in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open and was notified by the International Tennis Federation.
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| Getty Images - Sharapova in October 2015 in Singapore. |
Novak Djokovic, the top-ranked man in world and a friend of Sharapova’s, said that he felt sorry for her, but that she still must be ready for punishment. “The player that has made this mistake has to suffer certain kind of consequences,” he said.
Dozens of athletes, including many from Russia, are facing positive tests for the drug. The large number of athletes could strengthen Sharapova’s claim that this was a mistake. But Andy Murray, ranked No. 2 in the world, said the volume of positive tests also raises questions.
“You just don’t expect high-level athletes at the top of many different sports to have heart conditions,” Murray said. “If you’re taking a prescription drug that you don’t actually need for what it’s giving you, then that’s wrong.”
Read an extended version of this article at WSJ.com.
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