Doping in Soccer/Football

[JimmyFingers]

Don't get the complaints about the heat. If they have the games at 8 and 11 (6 and 9 for the European market which is perfectly normal) then the heat will have calmed.to.about 35 and under. Cyclists ride through temperatures above that sometimes at the tour and especially vuelta. I think superstars on 20 mil a year can manage it for 90 minutes.

35 and under? Still pretty fierce but yes, playable in. I would qualify that by saying one of the reasons cyclists can deal with the heat is the wind chill, which is much less of a cooling factor for slower moving athletes. In an enclosed stadium temperatures at pitch level can get very hard.

Whatever the heat is, Qatar is a monumentally crap place to holding a world cup however

 

[Caruut]

Don't get the complaints about the heat. If they have the games at 8 and 11 (6 and 9 for the European market which is perfectly normal) then the heat will have calmed.to.about 35 and under. Cyclists ride through temperatures above that sometimes at the tour and especially vuelta. I think superstars on 20 mil a year can manage it for 90 minutes.

There is, like Jimmy says, the wind chill. That's a huge factor - think about how much more you feel the heat going uphill or right after a ride than on the flat portion of the ride itself. There's also the fact that it represents something of a distortion - it devalues the competition to have it played in extreme competitions. Holding the World Cup on 150m long pitches would place similar demands on the athletes involved and makes no additional unreasonable assumptions about what they can physically do, but it does change things a lot.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

35 and under? Still pretty fierce but yes, playable in. I would qualify that by saying one of the reasons cyclists can deal with the heat is the wind chill, which is much less of a cooling factor for slower moving athletes. In an enclosed stadium temperatures at pitch level can get very hard.

Whatever the heat is, Qatar is a monumentally crap place to holding a world cup however

The pace of the games will be pretty chronic in those temperatures too, which will be abysmal for the spectacle. In cycling, you find that the average pace in the Vuelta is lower, which counterbalances some of the effect of the heat. In cycling that's ok because the stage is still just as hard (well, maybe. This is Unipublic) and the riders will still be suffering when they get to the final stages, whereas every football game is, in theory, the same. 90 minutes on a flat pitch.

 

[Alphabet]

The temperature is the least of our worries. Qatar has a population of around 2 million, over half of which are immigrants on work visas who could turn around and go home tomorrow if they were sacked. The country is also tiny, there will be virtually nothing for tourists to do other than watch football and then sweat in the heat. They don't have the numbers to fill out World Cup stadiums by themselves, and aside from neighbouring Arab nations, I don't think a lot of people are going to visit the country during the summer months to watch football.

Beyond all that, Qatar are a laughably incompetent football team who would never qualify for the World Cup if they weren't hosting it; and will be embarrassed at the tournament unless they're given a really easy group and naturalise half-a-dozen Brazilians by then. If FIFA did want a 'World Cup for the Arab World' as Blatter et al were talking about immediately after the verdict, they could have given it to a nation with pedigree in the sport- Egypt, or possibly Saudi Arabia. Keeping in mind this is 2022 and any political issues in either nation would be most likely resolved by then, Egypt would have been a perfect choice for an Arab World Cup. Strong football team and football culture within the country, slightly less hostile weather, things to do around the country when the football isn't on, and a government and society that isn't backward. It'll be hilarious if Israel qualify for the 2022 World Cup.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

The Australian football competition, the A-league is on now, summer in Australia. Sometimes the games are played in extreme heat.
These games a generally played at a much slower tempo and are flat boring affairs. They also take drink breaks half way through the halves, sometimes just the first half if the conditions are cooling. Still I think it gets hotter in Qatar than even Perth Australia's hottest city.
Qatar should not be hosting the World Cup for many reasons.

 

[Alphabet]

Our hottest major city is Brisbane. And even then, the summer average high is only around 31- hot, but nothing like the 40+ temperatures in Qatar. Also it cools down quite a bit at night, late evening matches could be played in 25 or even less than 20 degree weather depending on the city. Finally, the World Cup if held in Australia would be in the winter months, and it doesn't snow anywhere in Australia except for a small mountain range near Canberra. So matches would be played in around 10-25 degree weather.

Wikipedia tells me that Qatar's average July temperatures are max 41, min 27.

Getting back on the topic of doping, I've been watching the Africa Cup of Nations and as always, the big countries- Ivory Coast, Ghana, Cameroon- have been eliminated early, at the expense of minnow nations like Zambia, Burkina Faso and Cape Verde. Could it be that when the big European stars that play for the West African giants are clean when they play this tournament, resulting in the minnow nations being able to beat them? I don't think African international football is a hotbed for doping, their football associations barely get enough money to run the sport in their country as it is and their board chairmen are corrupt and embezzle from their funds instead of investing it.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

Our hottest major city is Brisbane. And even then, the summer average high is only around 31- hot, but nothing like the 40+ temperatures in Qatar. Also it cools down quite a bit at night, late evening matches could be played in 25 or even less than 20 degree weather depending on the city. Finally, the World Cup if held in Australia would be in the winter months, and it doesn't snow anywhere in Australia except for a small mountain range near Canberra. So matches would be played in around 10-25 degree weather.

Wikipedia tells me that Qatar's average July temperatures are max 41, min 27.

Getting back on the topic of doping, I've been watching the Africa Cup of Nations and as always, the big countries- Ivory Coast, Ghana, Cameroon- have been eliminated early, at the expense of minnow nations like Zambia, Burkina Faso and Cape Verde. Could it be that when the big European stars that play for the West African giants are clean when they play this tournament, resulting in the minnow nations being able to beat them? I don't think African international football is a hotbed for doping, their football associations barely get enough money to run the sport in their country as it is and their board chairmen are corrupt and embezzle from their funds instead of investing it.

Perth has a higher average temperature in January and February and much higher record temperatures. Brisbane's highest ever temperature is 41.7, Perth and Adelaide would both have a number of day every year that is higher than that.

 

[Alphabet]

Perth has a higher average temperature in January and February and much higher record temperatures. Brisbane's highest ever temperature is 41.7, Perth and Adelaide would both have a number of day every year that is higher than that.

I was talking about year-round. Perth has a proper winter, Brisbane is sub-tropical.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

I was talking about year-round. Perth has a proper winter, Brisbane is sub-tropical.

I was talking about the temperature it could get to during soccer games and how the heat effects the games. Average over the whole year is a pretty useless measure for that.

 

[The Hitch]

Wikipedia tells me that Qatar's average July temperatures are max 41, min 27.

That's not max. that's the average high. Some.days it will be lower some days it will be higher. Their max goes past 50

 

[Fearless Greg Lemond]

That's not max. that's the average high. Some.days it will be lower some days it will be higher. Their max goes past 50

Do not worry, there will be airco's. The first World Cup of Airco Football. Indoors of course. C02 neutral

 

[neezabja]

In Arsene we trust

Arsene Wenger: our game is full of drug-fuelled 'legends' and needs to be cleaned up

Link to the original article: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...elled-legends-and-needs-to-be-cleaned-up.html

Arsène Wenger has issued a stark wake-up call to the football authorities over the issues of doping and match-fixing, claiming that sport has become “full of legends who are in fact cheats”.

The Arsenal manager also revealed his belief that cheating has been widespread in football for decades and wants the anti-doping controls to include regular in-competition testing of the players’ blood as well as urine.

As manager of Monaco at the time of the Marseille scandal in 1993, Wenger has been among the victims of serious corruption in football but was still taken aback by the scale of the Europol match-fixing investigation which has identified 360 suspect games.

“It’s a real tsunami,” he said. “I can’t accept it and I always was a believer that there’s a lot of cheating going on in our game and that we are not strong enough with what happens, nor with the doping, nor with the corruption of the referees, nor with the match fixing. It’s time that we tackle this problem in a very serious way and that people who cheat are punished in a very severe way.

“You cannot accept that somebody who works the whole week decides to spend his money to go to a game and you cheat him because all is decided before he gets to the stand.”

Wenger has also closely followed the case of Spanish doctor Eufemiano Fuentes, who is on trial over allegations that he doped cyclists. As well as cyclists, tennis players, athletes and boxers, Fuentes has confirmed that footballers were among his *clients. Iñaki Badiola, the former Real Sociedad president, has also alleged that the club made payments to Fuentes of about £280,000 a year before he became president.



Fuentes denies being involved in doping and Wenger is frustrated that the trial will not force him to reveal the identities of the people he treated. “They have found pockets of blood but they don’t even ask to whom does that belong,” Wenger said.

“They are not interested at all. The justice should go deeper. When you look at the functions of this doctor it is quite scary. He was involved in the Olympic team, football team and cycling team.”

Asked if football’s drug testing programme was sufficient, Wenger said: “Honestly, I don’t think we do enough. It is very difficult for me to believe that you have 740 players in the World Cup and you come out with zero problems. Look at psychological tests that have been done on people who are at the top in all sports.

"When they ask them if they would take a product that would guarantee them a gold medal or a world championship, but mean that they died in the next five years, 50 per cent say ‘yes’. If you go to amateur level and do that test, only two per cent say they would take it.

“That is quite scary. That is how far people are ready to go to win in all sports. We are at the level where people are ready to do anything to win.”

Wenger wants regular in-competition blood testing in football. “When you have a doping control at Uefa, they do not take blood, they take only urine. I have asked many times in Geneva [for that to be changed]. Sometimes you have to wait for two hours after the game, so blood could be a lot quicker. I hope we do not have a big problem with doping but we have to try to see how deep we can go into control.”

Uefa said yesterday that their existing doping controls may include blood, urine samples and any other biological material both in competition and out of competition. They also stressed that both blood and urine samples were collected at all doping controls prior to and during Euro 2012. Fifa are planning to have in-competition blood testing at this year’s Confederations Cup and next year’s World Cup.

Wenger said that he could not say whether English football was immune from a doping problem but his experiences do make him believe that match-fixing is not an issue in our national game. “It’s not a perfect world but I don’t think cheating or match-fixing is a problem,” he said. “I personally feel English football is clean of cheating 100%. I don’t think referees are corrupt”

Wenger was managing in France with Monaco during the 1992-93 season when Marseille bribed opposition players. The one proven case relates to a match against Valenciennes in 1993 when three players were offered bribes to “take their foot off the gas”, but there have been other anecdotal allegations – none proven – suggesting more widespread corruption.

“I knew what was going on, but people say ‘come on, show us the proof’,” Wenger said. “It’s very difficult to come out with that. I dis*covered it slowly. If you support or manage a club and you spend sleepless nights thinking, ‘how can I win the next game?’ but in the end you discover it’s useless because it’s all done. You feel it’s a waste of time.”

 

[The Hitch]

Massive respect to wenger for that.

Especially for the comment about the pre olympics "would you take drugs to win" questionaire.

That point was made a number of times in the clinic but of course all the olympic broadcasters and broadcasters of all sports find it offensive and suggestive of mental health problems to question if top athletes would take drugs.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

Some great comments which hopefully will cause some people to wake up.

 

[nevada]

Sepp doesn't see a problem.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

Sepp doesn't see a problem.

Sepp is part of the problem.

 

[Descender]

Sepp is the problem.

 

[sniper]

It'll be a good day when journos start digging renewed into the series of positives that hit players from Barca in the late 90s early 2000s.
Didn't a certain Pep test positive as well?
Time to ask questions and connect dots.

 

[Descender]

Guardiola tested positive while playing for Brescia though.

What Barça players tested positive?

 

[Jack (6 ch)]

More on football in the Telegraph by ex England player Danny Mills


“I had four cortisone injections. I took a lot of advice. I took an interest in what I was putting into my body. Lots of players didn’t question it. It wasn’t illegal but it was pushing your body to the limit and past it for the sake of the team. Lads would pop anti-inflammatories religiously. If you have a bad back or bad knee, it’s a fantastic drug but you’re just hiding the issue.
“Players would do anything to get an edge on team-mates or opponents. People said: ‘Creatine’s bad for you, people are dying’. Taken in wrong amounts yes. But it allows you to build lean muscle quicker. I took it.
“Night Nurse was banned for a while. Night Nurse is fantastic. If you’re struggling to get to sleep, Night Nurse knocks you out. I took it. That could possibly have cost me my career.
"There was a period when I had five doping tests in a row! It got to the point where I said: ‘If you do me again, I’m not turning up’.
“I’ve had PRP [platelet rich plasma] injections. If you have a muscle injury, you take out blood and spin it. It separates white and red cells and the plasma. The plasma has all the antibodies so that is injected into an injury and aids healing time by a third. It was undetectable.
"I was offered it in the States after having some physio there. A guy came up to me with his business card, saying: This is what we do, PRP injections’. It was illegal at the time.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...-would-do-almost-anything-to-get-an-edge.html

Is the net closing on football?

 

[AcademyCC]

Sepp is the problem.

Here here. That guy makes Pat McQuaid look like a Saint

God knows what's going on in football.

 

[sniper]

Guardiola tested positive while playing for Brescia though.

What Barça players tested positive?

Frank de Boer, Pep, Edgar Davids, Fernando Couto.
Four (ex-)Barca players, all tested positive in roughly the same time frame, all(?) for nandrolon.
I don't have time to check the chronology of events for each of them.
But at least one pattern seems to be that all four played for Barca.
Potential patterns: there might be some Barca-Ajax-AC Milan link if we consider also Jaap Stam.
All five except Frank de Boer played (and I believe got caught) in Italy, which is not an unimportant detail either.
Anyway, no time to dig into this deeper, but seems to me this is worth looking into renewed.

 

[Pancreas]

More on football in the Telegraph by ex England player Danny Mills


“I had four cortisone injections. I took a lot of advice. I took an interest in what I was putting into my body. Lots of players didn’t question it. It wasn’t illegal but it was pushing your body to the limit and past it for the sake of the team. Lads would pop anti-inflammatories religiously. If you have a bad back or bad knee, it’s a fantastic drug but you’re just hiding the issue.
“Players would do anything to get an edge on team-mates or opponents. People said: ‘Creatine’s bad for you, people are dying’. Taken in wrong amounts yes. But it allows you to build lean muscle quicker. I took it.
“Night Nurse was banned for a while. Night Nurse is fantastic. If you’re struggling to get to sleep, Night Nurse knocks you out. I took it. That could possibly have cost me my career.
"There was a period when I had five doping tests in a row! It got to the point where I said: ‘If you do me again, I’m not turning up’.
“I’ve had PRP [platelet rich plasma] injections. If you have a muscle injury, you take out blood and spin it. It separates white and red cells and the plasma. The plasma has all the antibodies so that is injected into an injury and aids healing time by a third. It was undetectable.
"I was offered it in the States after having some physio there. A guy came up to me with his business card, saying: This is what we do, PRP injections’. It was illegal at the time.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...-would-do-almost-anything-to-get-an-edge.html

Is the net closing on football?

Hopefully some journos pick up on this and go asking more questions. It does seem like there has been a more harsh stance on all sports since Armstrong affaire.

Way too late and still way too weak of course, but better than the head-in-the-sand journalism of the last 15 years

 

[JimmyFingers]

Wenger calls for more testing in football

I'm not claiming Arsenal are clean, but since it's my team it's good to hear the manager saying something like this when there's not really a debate going on about doping in football in the media yet. We need more names from Fuentes.

Wenger also spoke of his frustration at the ongoing trial in Madrid of Dr Eufemiano Fuentes, who was allegedly at the centre of the Operation Puerto doping ring. The trial has been limited to cycling, even though Fuentes himself has admitted to working with sportsmen from other fields. The former Real Sociedad president, Inaki Badiola, has said that before he took charge in 2008, the club had made covert payments for "medicines or products classified as doping" substances and that Fuentes "could have been" the supplier. His predecessor as president, José Luis Astiazarán, responded by saying: "I never had knowledge or suspicion of illegal practices by the club's medical services, who always worked to the maximum ethical and professional standards. If I had, I would have taken the necessary action."

 

[sniper]

Here here. That guy makes Pat McQuaid look like a Saint

God knows what's going on in football.

most friggin definitely.

football is a joke.

caruut had a good post a few pages back, sketching how long it most likely is going to take for any serious reform to take place in football.

even if they start introducing a bit more bloodtesting next year, it'll take ages before they even come close to understanding that the testing should be FIFA/UEFA independent.