The Best Case for Doping in Football

[AlbineVespuzzio]

Chelsea Last Campaign.

Quite clear what happened last year.

Principal Doctor in collision course with the manager over a fait-diver, doctors team is removed from 1st team affairs, doctor quits.

The team never sets off into the season: their players (champions in the previous season) look like kids playing in a senior league, even though they clearly have better quality than the others. Only Man City had the same quality, and maybe United and Arsenal (in a couple of positions)

Mourinho, the manager, not stupid of course, never seems too worried: one can argue he was angling for the United job, he never looked bothered by the results and getting fired would set him free to the position he now occupies: in that case (your heart is no longer with this club), no reason to replace the doctors.

Mourinho himself, in his own style mentioned the difference of performance between the year they were champions and the next where they could hardly cling to mid-table. His words are coded, in a way, but their significance is quite clear, if you know from what perspective to hear them; paraphrasing:

"maybe this is the true value of my players, maybe last year they were overperforming"

He is known as not being shy in telling truths, even though, in a case like this one, in a coded way.


Finally, the club regrouped, restructured, brought a new team, with new doctors (italian, presumably), Costa/Hazard are back to being World Class, decisive, and Chelsea are back getting results, which is what you expect from the quality of those players.

 

[PremierAndrew]

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

 

[Ramon Koran]

Chelsea Last Campaign.

Quite clear what happened last year.

Principal Doctor in collision course with the manager over a fait-diver, doctors team is removed from 1st team affairs, doctor quits.

The team never sets off into the season: their players (champions in the previous season) look like kids playing in a senior league, even though they clearly have better quality than the others. Only Man City had the same quality, and maybe United and Arsenal (in a couple of positions)

Mourinho, the manager, not stupid of course, never seems too worried: one can argue he was angling for the United job, he never looked bothered by the results and getting fired would set him free to the position he now occupies: in that case (your heart is no longer with this club), no reason to replace the doctors.

Mourinho himself, in his own style mentioned the difference of performance between the year they were champions and the next where they could hardly cling to mid-table. His words are coded, in a way, but their significance is quite clear, if you know from what perspective to hear them; paraphrasing:

"maybe this is the true value of my players, maybe last year they were overperforming"

He is known as not being shy in telling truths, even though, in a case like this one, in a coded way.


Finally, the club regrouped, restructured, brought a new team, with new doctors (italian, presumably), Costa/Hazard are back to being World Class, decisive, and Chelsea are back getting results, which is what you expect from the quality of those players.

NONSENSE, Chealsea played bad through lack of motivation and lack of fitness due to to much partying at the end of 2015 season

 

[Bwlch y Groes]

Hear me out on this one, guys - maybe the manager just, y'know, lost the backing and faith of the players

I know, radical thought

Either way, Chelsea were already in trouble when Carneiro was sacked. That was the whole point - Jose lost his rag and blamed her while angry things were already out of control

Not every sport is going to have as few variables as cycling or athletics. I'm not saying there's no doping (there's tonnes, almost certainly), but doping cannot provide such an easy explanation in the same way it can with sports with very few variables that just rely on running or cycling between fixed distances

The best case for doping in football is the evidence we already have for instances like 1970s German football or 1990s Serie A

 

[Pantani Attacks]

Doping in football wouldn't have had such an impact on Chelsea like last year. Their team is so naturally talented that it clearly wasn't a lack of juice that made them go caput. Now a team like Leicester whose game was based so much on extreme stamina and pressing and high tempo counter attacks is far more suspicious considering the Froome like transformation they had.

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

Re:

Hear me out on this one, guys - maybe the manager just, y'know, lost the backing and faith of the players

That's the general theory for the event, for people that don't consider doping is a factor in football. It makes sense in the mainstream, where you're not supposed to accept doping is widespread.

I know, radical thought

Not so much, as I said, it's just a mainstream thought. If you don't take into consideration what's obvious (doping), you'll have to find a different explanation. It's how the mind works.

Either way, Chelsea were already in trouble when Carneiro was sacked. That was the whole point - Jose lost his rag and blamed her while angry things were already out of control

Nobody was sacked. The doctor quit. Chelsea was not in trouble after 1 match when the doctor was removed from 1st team duties.

Not every sport is going to have as few variables as cycling or athletics. I'm not saying there's no doping (there's tonnes, almost certainly), but doping cannot provide such an easy explanation in the same way it can with sports with very few variables that just rely on running or cycling between fixed distances

You haven't commented the OP, if you want to argue the opposite position, perhaps you should start there?

The best case for doping in football is the evidence we already have for instances like 1970s German football or 1990s Serie A

Sure, the thread title is not to be taken literally. You can read it as "Yet another indication doping is still widespread in football", It just didn't have the same ring to it.

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

Re:

Doping in football wouldn't have had such an impact on Chelsea like last year. Their team is so naturally talented that it clearly wasn't a lack of juice that made them go caput. Now a team like Leicester whose game was based so much on extreme stamina and pressing and high tempo counter attacks is far more suspicious considering the Froome like transformation they had.

I think it's both. Leicester would never won a competition like the PL, if the top contenders were not all suffering from glitches in their doping programs:

Chelsea, read the OP
Man City, a real expert was on its way, announced in December. No need to invest on a crancky program, when next season things will be taken seriously.

Man United. Van Gaal has lost his touch long ago, he can't implement a proper season-long program, maybe he never could?

Arsenal, well, it's Arsenal, don't expect Wenger ever gets it right in terms of a doping program.

Leicester, with the good program and good players and tactics they had last season would be contenders for 6th, 5th or 4th in normal circunstances. They benefited from what happened in the big clubs, that seems clear to me.

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

NONSENSE, Chealsea played bad through lack of motivation and lack of fitness due to to much partying at the end of 2015 season

Nonsense and partying..

Thanks, that's a good contribution.

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

Re:

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

I think it does. No amount of talent can compete in a league where every other team has a good doping program. Running less means they won't get the ball enough (in conditions to create danger). Also, being tired in key moments of a match is of crucial importance.

 

[Ramon Koran]

NONSENSE, Chealsea played bad through lack of motivation and lack of fitness due to to much partying at the end of 2015 season

Nonsense and partying..

Thanks, that's a good contribution.

You can't accept your threat is pathetic and based on a load of rubbish so once someone explains the TRUTH you dismiss them, saddens me but no matter.

 

[sniper]

The problem with discussing doping in soccer is that we hardly have any idea of what is going on in the background at a 'clinical' level.
Which types of docs are there, what are they doing, who's calling the shots, how replaceable are these docs.
How different are doping programs between one top club and the other.
Etc.

Here I think the OP makes a good case. From what I can tell he's not claiming anything as fact, but is merely proposing a hypothesis. And imo a more or less plausible one, though not compelling.
I knew about Carneiro, obviously, but I didn't know that the head doc left, too.
When the head doc left, maybe Chelsea were left without a decent supervision of the doping/recovery program.
That said, one would probably expect a big club like chelsea to have that problem fixed by the start of the second half of the season. But they still sucked in the second half of the season.

I have to add I haven't seen any of Chelsea's games last season. But of course I heard how hard Hazard sucked.
Hazard's form at the Euro's, otoh, was spectacular. In that shape he's up there with Messi, imo.

 

[Bwlch y Groes]

Re: Re:

I know, radical thought

Not so much, as I said, it's just a mainstream thought. If you don't take into consideration what's obvious (doping), you'll have to find a different explanation. It's how the mind works.

I was being sarcastic. The point is I think with football, performances are probably still Occam's razor at this stage. Mourinho's dropped hints before about Dr Needles and his mid-2000s Chelsea and late-2000s Inter teams performed like doped teams (no way did Javier Zanetti prolong his career like that naturally, for one), so I'm not disputing the doping aspect of it. I just don't see how we can go from that to suddenly thinking that variations or mistakes in doping programmes is suddenly the determining factor in how a team performs

Ultimately, I know the whole "there's no doping in football because it's a skill sport" narrative is a total fallacy but there's an element of truth in it. With cycling or running, the main variable is the athlete him/herself. They are relatively objective sports - the person who goes the fastest between 1 point and another wins. It lends itself to a much more controlled environment. It makes it easier to quantify and easier to manipulate with something like PEDs. Football is far more subjective - a team can dominate 89 of the 90 minutes and still lose. You can dope a player all you want but it won't necessarily make him top class in the same way that pumping a cyclist full of drugs and putting him on a training programme might

To me, the main benefit of doping in football is allowing the players to a) train harder and b) run harder in a match without getting tired. A team like Barcelona, who have their intricate passing and high-pressing style which is very hard on the players physically, are a prime example of a team who is almost certainly doping - they would not have been able to play that way 20 years ago because players just weren't that fit. But as people have pointed out in the discussions about England-Iceland, that's something that usually has its greatest effect over the course of a season. I doubt England-Iceland was solely down to doping - I think it was most likely just down to the fact that English players tend to play more football than Icelandic players, with no winter break (there's loads of statistical analysis on how the winter breaks in Europe help players), and the England team was just physically and mentally knackered when it came to the Euros, which just made it look like Iceland were on some kind of radical programme. Plus Hodgson didn't have a clue how to set the team up tactically - that much was obvious in the previous 3 matches

With Chelsea I really don't see how it was down to some kind of different programme or if it was somehow messed up. At the end of the day, these were players who had played a lot of football the previous season - they'd won the league, the League Cup and gone deep into the Champions League, plus you have the increasingly long haul post-season and pre-season jaunts for friendlies which takes it out of the players as well. Given that 2014-15 was coming off a World Cup year in which a lot of the players had had little rest the previous summer (and nearly all of Chelsea's key players had been involved), it's easy to see why players might be getting tired - doping can only do so much to stop athletes tiring

Add in Mourinho's intensive style of management which eventually went too far (we also saw this at Real Madrid, only this time it was clearly affecting the confidence of some of the team's best players) and the odd injury (Courtois being out changed the dynamic of the defence and Zouma also blew out his knee in February) and it's easy to see how things could unravel. And then you have to add in that even when they won the title, their performances had been declining in the second half of the season (which again could be explained by the fatigue)

Of course it's quite unprecedented in recent times that the English champions would bomb in their title defence but I think just labelling it as "down to drugs" is a bit lazy. There were lots of factors feeding into it. But the bigger picture is it's becoming harder and harder to defend the title. No one's done it since Cristiano Ronaldo left the league, and I can't see Leicester doing it this year

I think it's just the fact that, as in cycling, the work load is higher and higher each year and the standards keep going up as well, so it's becoming harder to string together a run of success in England - Bayern, Barcelona and Juventus are able to do it because there are only a maximum of 2 or 3 teams capable of challenging them over the course of a season anyway, whereas in England it has become far more competitive and the financial situation is now more evenly spread so it's harder to sustain that. Chelsea fell foul of that but they'll be back this year now that Hazard and Costa are back to their best and they've signed Kante who will reinforce the midfield and Batshuayi who gives them another option up front (and Moses is back too)

 

[The Hitch]

Re:

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

I think it could. Not saying it did, but I think most people and especially the media greatly underestimate just how powerful doping can be.

 

[Bwlch y Groes]

Re: Re:

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

I think it could. Not saying it did, but I think most people and especially the media greatly underestimate just how powerful doping can be.

Doping's powerful in the long term but is it really powerful in the short term? When Hazard was playing really well for Chelsea, his form for Belgium was disappointing. And yet in 2015, when he was struggling for Chelsea, he had his best ever year for Belgium, scoring 6 in 9 appearances

With Costa, he suddenly picked up in his last year at Atletico. He went from scoring 10 goals in a league season to 27. The only season he had previously come close was his single year at Rayo Vallecano where he had scored 10 in 16. He continued that form into his first Premier League season, then dropped off a bit (but not to his pre-Atleti form) last season, and his back on it again this season

I think it's too easy to just write it all off as doping-related. Player form is clearly much more complicated than that - tactical systems and player confidence (especially for someone like Hazard) clearly play into it. Obviously there are tactics in athletics and cycling but with football is much more complex. Each team plays in a different way and so much effort goes into rehersing those tactics over and over again. Teams stagnate when other teams work out how to play them, so there's a need for constant change, and players don't always adapt well because they've been bred from a young age to do a particular role or to a particular environment. That happens from the Premier League down to part-time level

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

NONSENSE, Chealsea played bad through lack of motivation and lack of fitness due to to much partying at the end of 2015 season

Nonsense and partying..

Thanks, that's a good contribution.

You can't accept your threat is pathetic and based on a load of rubbish so once someone explains the TRUTH you dismiss them, saddens me but no matter.

I can see this is not a sensitive subject to you. Always the best way to approach an issue, I'm with you.

 

[SeriousSam]

"maybe this is the true value of my players, maybe last year they were overperforming"

He is known as not being shy in telling truths, even though, in a case like this one, in a coded way.

It's obviously self-aggrandisement, like most of his remarks. The message here isn't that they doped last year and aren't doping this year, it's that they're *** but The Special One is so special that he made them into winners anyway.

 

[AlbineVespuzzio]

Re: Re:

I know, radical thought

Not so much, as I said, it's just a mainstream thought. If you don't take into consideration what's obvious (doping), you'll have to find a different explanation. It's how the mind works.

I was being sarcastic. The point is I think with football, performances are probably still Occam's razor at this stage. Mourinho's dropped hints before about Dr Needles and his mid-2000s Chelsea and late-2000s Inter teams performed like doped teams (no way did Javier Zanetti prolong his career like that naturally, for one), so I'm not disputing the doping aspect of it. I just don't see how we can go from that to suddenly thinking that variations or mistakes in doping programmes is suddenly the determining factor in how a team performs

I think it is. Players unhappyness theories seem to me the conspiratorial thinking. Makes a difference in form? Of course it does, but not big. And players don't become "unhappy" in groups. One might become, he will work "softer" in practice and in matchday, the manager realises and drops him off the team. Conspiracies against the manager doesn't suit well in me, it doesn't look credible. Major dips in form can only be explained by doping, in my view. Another case from last year: Barcelona, around April. 1 point in 12 for the league and elimination from the CL. Totally uncharacteristic game from them. Was it their technical skill that dipped? Of course not. Were they on April strike or something? Of course not, makes no sense either, they're professionals. Bad planning, that's what explains it.

Ultimately, I know the whole "there's no doping in football because it's a skill sport" narrative is a total fallacy but there's an element of truth in it. With cycling or running, the main variable is the athlete him/herself. They are relatively objective sports - the person who goes the fastest between 1 point and another wins. It lends itself to a much more controlled environment. It makes it easier to quantify and easier to manipulate with something like PEDs. Football is far more subjective - a team can dominate 89 of the 90 minutes and still lose. You can dope a player all you want but it won't necessarily make him top class in the same way that pumping a cyclist full of drugs and putting him on a training programme might

There's an element of truth in it, but it has no relevance, because the argument is not about skill. Doping does not affect skill, the issue is endurance, the ability to perform and stay fresh for 90 minutes, twice a week: that's why they do it (must do it). Your argument becomes thus irrelevant.

With Chelsea I really don't see how it was down to some kind of different programme or if it was somehow messed up. At the end of the day, these were players who had played a lot of football the previous season - they'd won the league, the League Cup and gone deep into the Champions League, plus you have the increasingly long haul post-season and pre-season jaunts for friendlies which takes it out of the players as well. Given that 2014-15 was coming off a World Cup year in which a lot of the players had had little rest the previous summer (and nearly all of Chelsea's key players had been involved), it's easy to see why players might be getting tired - doping can only do so much to stop athletes tiring

That's what doping is for. To be able to play a lot from season to season, every season. Like Barça, Munich, RM and Atletico show, consistently. If it's done correctly, it works. Anyways, what you mention wouldn't justify an entire team dipping for an entire year. The lack of team doctor and the lack of interest from the manager in solving the issue seems to be the answer to me.

Add in Mourinho's intensive style of management which eventually went too far (we also saw this at Real Madrid, only this time it was clearly affecting the confidence of some of the team's best players) and the odd injury (Courtois being out changed the dynamic of the defence and Zouma also blew out his knee in February) and it's easy to see how things could unravel. And then you have to add in that even when they won the title, their performances had been declining in the second half of the season (which again could be explained by the fatigue)

He never had a bad season in RM. His last season he won the Supercup (beginning of the season) and was in it in everything until the end: Runners-up in league, Semi-final in Champions League and Final in the National Cup. You're looking for explanations all over the place, no matter how meaningless they are: it feels like an emotional attachment clouding your judgement. Look, I like both football and cycling, it doesn't stop me from seeing things clear. The trick is not letting emotion get in the way of reason.

Of course it's quite unprecedented in recent times that the English champions would bomb in their title defence but I think just labelling it as "down to drugs" is a bit lazy. There were lots of factors feeding into it. But the bigger picture is it's becoming harder and harder to defend the title. No one's done it since Cristiano Ronaldo left the league, and I can't see Leicester doing it this year

One thing is not winning the league twice in a row. Another thing is barely clinging to mid-table in the title defence. That would be a fallacy too, a false equivalency. The competition is hard in England, but it's a misconception that the big clubs are not dominant. Look at the winners since the PL started. It's 3 or 4 clubs that challenge for the titles, same as in the other leagues, roughly.

I think it's just the fact that, as in cycling, the work load is higher and higher each year and the standards keep going up as well, so it's becoming harder to string together a run of success in England - Bayern, Barcelona and Juventus are able to do it because there are only a maximum of 2 or 3 teams capable of challenging them over the course of a season anyway, whereas in England it has become far more competitive and the financial situation is now more evenly spread so it's harder to sustain that. Chelsea fell foul of that but they'll be back this year now that Hazard and Costa are back to their best and they've signed Kante who will reinforce the midfield and Batshuayi who gives them another option up front (and Moses is back too)

You're contradicting yourself. You're pointing out major clubs that are consistent in being strong. The awkward thing is Chelsea last season, and what makes sense to me is that it's about doping (lack of).

The day Barcelona or Bayern with a champions squad visits the despromotion zone and finishes in 10th, I'll look at it and probably conclude the same thing: doping (lack of).

 

[Ramon Koran]

NONSENSE, Chealsea played bad through lack of motivation and lack of fitness due to to much partying at the end of 2015 season

Nonsense and partying..

Thanks, that's a good contribution.

You can't accept your threat is pathetic and based on a load of rubbish so once someone explains the TRUTH you dismiss them, saddens me but no matter.

I can see this is not a sensitive subject to you. Always the best way to approach an issue, I'm with you.

Thanks man good to see I won you over.

 

[T_S_A_R]

Re:

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

Hazard has played 474 senior games for club and country and won't turn 26 until January.

He is a medical marvel.

 

[Vladivar]

Chelsea Last Campaign.

Quite clear what happened last year.

Principal Doctor in collision course with the manager over a fait-diver, doctors team is removed from 1st team affairs, doctor quits.

The team never sets off into the season: their players (champions in the previous season) look like kids playing in a senior league, even though they clearly have better quality than the others. Only Man City had the same quality, and maybe United and Arsenal (in a couple of positions)

Mourinho, the manager, not stupid of course, never seems too worried: one can argue he was angling for the United job, he never looked bothered by the results and getting fired would set him free to the position he now occupies: in that case (your heart is no longer with this club), no reason to replace the doctors.

Mourinho himself, in his own style mentioned the difference of performance between the year they were champions and the next where they could hardly cling to mid-table. His words are coded, in a way, but their significance is quite clear, if you know from what perspective to hear them; paraphrasing:

"maybe this is the true value of my players, maybe last year they were overperforming"

He is known as not being shy in telling truths, even though, in a case like this one, in a coded way.


Finally, the club regrouped, restructured, brought a new team, with new doctors (italian, presumably), Costa/Hazard are back to being World Class, decisive, and Chelsea are back getting results, which is what you expect from the quality of those players.

You appear to not understand that the medical staff at pitchside for a game are usually way down the pecking order of medical staff employed by the club. More often than not pitchside medical staff will be physios as most injuries in football are muscle related. Im sure some will have paramedic training as well to a very high standard in case of head injury or Marc Vivian Foe types of incident.


Chelsea were rubbish last season for other reasons, including Mourinho losing the dressing room, the players egos being overinflated and the simple fact that in the long history of English football there have only been a handful of moments of one team dominating the league.

The sheer intensity of English football, plus its extra Cup competition, its lack of a winter break (for traditional reasons) also contributes to Englands abject failures at International tournaments. England usually have injury problems and are tired. Other nations not so much.

In Spain Basically 2 teams win the league, with Athetico Madrid in the mix
In Germany Bayern win by streets
In Italy Juve win, with few challengers
In France there is PSG
In England this year i condsider City, United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool as all contenders. With a number not far behind. It makes every game hard. In the EPL there are no easy games ever.

Now none of what i have said in anyway means i dont think doping goes on in English football as Rio Ferdinands mysterious disppearence showed, bit i do doubt it is widespread because i simply cannot for the life of me think why a Player on £100,000+ per week would endanger that contract. They are already great players but with a short earning potential.

Im sure many will think im naive, but i have been watching football weekly since 1968, i have seen my club on over 100 different grounds ergo i am not a casual fan.

 

[motty89]

Chelsea Last Campaign.

Quite clear what happened last year.

Principal Doctor in collision course with the manager over a fait-diver, doctors team is removed from 1st team affairs, doctor quits.

The team never sets off into the season: their players (champions in the previous season) look like kids playing in a senior league, even though they clearly have better quality than the others. Only Man City had the same quality, and maybe United and Arsenal (in a couple of positions)

Mourinho, the manager, not stupid of course, never seems too worried: one can argue he was angling for the United job, he never looked bothered by the results and getting fired would set him free to the position he now occupies: in that case (your heart is no longer with this club), no reason to replace the doctors.

Mourinho himself, in his own style mentioned the difference of performance between the year they were champions and the next where they could hardly cling to mid-table. His words are coded, in a way, but their significance is quite clear, if you know from what perspective to hear them; paraphrasing:

"maybe this is the true value of my players, maybe last year they were overperforming"

He is known as not being shy in telling truths, even though, in a case like this one, in a coded way.


Finally, the club regrouped, restructured, brought a new team, with new doctors (italian, presumably), Costa/Hazard are back to being World Class, decisive, and Chelsea are back getting results, which is what you expect from the quality of those players.

You appear to not understand that the medical staff at pitchside for a game are usually way down the pecking order of medical staff employed by the club. More often than not pitchside medical staff will be physios as most injuries in football are muscle related. Im sure some will have paramedic training as well to a very high standard in case of head injury or Marc Vivian Foe types of incident.


Chelsea were rubbish last season for other reasons, including Mourinho losing the dressing room, the players egos being overinflated and the simple fact that in the long history of English football there have only been a handful of moments of one team dominating the league.

The sheer intensity of English football, plus its extra Cup competition, its lack of a winter break (for traditional reasons) also contributes to Englands abject failures at International tournaments. England usually have injury problems and are tired. Other nations not so much.

In Spain Basically 2 teams win the league, with Athetico Madrid in the mix
In Germany Bayern win by streets
In Italy Juve win, with few challengers
In France there is PSG
In England this year i condsider City, United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool as all contenders. With a number not far behind. It makes every game hard. In the EPL there are no easy games ever.

Now none of what i have said in anyway means i dont think doping goes on in English football as Rio Ferdinands mysterious disppearence showed, bit i do doubt it is widespread because i simply cannot for the life of me think why a Player on £100,000+ per week would endanger that contract. They are already great players but with a short earning potential.

Im sure many will think im naive, but i have been watching football weekly since 1968, i have seen my club on over 100 different grounds ergo i am not a casual fan.

you might want to google " juventus doping". Fact is even if it all comes out no one really cares (eg guardiolas failed test).

as an aside anyone know anything about the doctor Ramon Segura. He was at Brescia when guardiola was popped for nandrolone and also worked with de boer when he tested positive for the same thing. Later he was at Barcelona when pep was in charge...

 

[sniper]

Vladivar forgets that they likely doped to get that 100 grant plus salary in the first place.
No player is likely to get to the top level without gear.
It was like that already in the 70s and the game has only gotten exponentially more explosive since then.

That said, imo its true that the incredible width of the PL makes it more possible for top teams to have a fluke year, regardless of the doping issue.

 

[poupou]

...Now none of what i have said in anyway means i dont think doping goes on in English football as Rio Ferdinands mysterious disppearence showed, bit i do doubt it is widespread because i simply cannot for the life of me think why a Player on £100,000+ per week would endanger that contract. They are already great players but with a short earning potential.

Im sure many will think im naive, but i have been watching football weekly since 1968, i have seen my club on over 100 different grounds ergo i am not a casual fan.

Il a club pays such money, they are wanting a ROI on their players who are moraly bind to perform and even to play with injuries.

It's very naive to think that there is less doping in football even in England with what we have learnt in Italy or even recently with Fuentes' case.

 

[buckle]

Re: Re:

Doping doesn't make anywhere near enough difference to explain Costa and Hazard last year

I think it could. Not saying it did, but I think most people and especially the media greatly underestimate just how powerful doping can be.

I was flamed for saying something similar on another thread in respect of England v Iceland (but also England in Brazil in 2014 with one point in 3 games). I suspect that under the Gerrard captaincy https://www.theguardian.com/football/2010/jun/21/john-terry-england-squad things became complex in respect of a program. Under Rooney the ambiguity continued with the co-operation of Hodgson (now we have Shearer demanding that Rooney retire from England duty!).

When I even suggested that morality might have perhaps played a role in Gerrard's decision I was laughed out of court. Yet even Kimmage claimed in "Rough Ride" that he was morally troubled by doping.

These issues are extremely complex.

 

[jaekwon]

Hi guys, long time lurker making my first post.

How believable is Wenger's anti-doping stance? He has complained about incoming players having abnormally high red blood cell count during their medicals and his teams are plagued with injuries, as well as Arsenal dropping off towards the end of every season. So is Arsene the exception in using a team wide doping programme? A number of his standout players have known doping connections, so they could have outsourced. To name a few - Henry from Monaco and Juve, Sanchez from barca/guardiola and Ozil with Germany.

Anyway, the reason I'm making this post is because injury riddled Wilshere could be off to Juve and I wouldn't be surprised if he has a massive resurgence there with the help of their "doctors". I won't even get into Pirlo and Evra's longevity. If so, what would this say about Arsene, as it would show that he doesn't really dope his players, or needs a new doctor lol.