Djokovic calls for overhaul of 'unfair' anti-doping system in tennis

Novak Djokovic on Monday urged tennis authorities to overhaul the sport's anti-doping system, pointing to "inconsistencies" in cases involving top stars Jannik Sinner and Iga Swiatek, and those brought against lower-ranked players.

World number one Sinner agreed to a three-month ban on Saturday, admitting "partial responsiblity" for mistakes by his team that led to him twice testing positive for traces of clostebol last March.

Italy's Sinner was facing a potential two-year suspension, after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against his initial exoneration by the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA), announced in August.

In a surprising move, WADA withdrew its appeal and came to an agreement with Sinner to accept a three-month ban.

In another high-profile case last year, Poland's five-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek accepted a one-month suspension after testing positive for the banned heart drug trimetazidine.

"There's a majority of the players that I've talked to in the locker room, not just in the last few days, but also last few months, that are not happy with the way this whole process has been handled," said Djokovic.

"A majority of the players don't feel that it's fair. A majority of the players feel like there is favoritism happening. It seems like, it appears that you can almost affect the outcome if you are a top player, if you have access to the top lawyers."

In contrast, the recently-retired Simona Halep, a former world number one, was handed a four-year ban by the ITIA in 2022, after testing positive for the blood-boosting drug roxadustat.

The Romanian argued the result was the result of a tainted supplement, and successfully appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which reduced her suspension to nine months.

"Simona Halep and (Great Britain's) Tara Moore and some other players that are maybe less known, that have been struggling to resolve their cases for years, or have gotten the ban for years," added Djokovic. "There is so much inconsistencies between the cases."

Serbia's Djokovic, who is returning to action this week at the Qatar Open for the first time since retiring injured from last month's Australian Open semifinals, believes a change is needed.

"Right now, it's a ripe time for us to really address the system, because the system and the structure obviously doesn't work (for) anti-doping, it's obvious," he said.

"I hope that in the next period of the near future that the governing bodies are going to come together, of our tours and the tennis ecosystem, and try to find a more effective way to deal with these processes. It's inconsistent, and it appears to be very unfair," the 24-time Grand Slam champion continued.

"If you are going to treat every case individually or independently, which is what's happening, then there's no consistency, then there is no transparency, and some cases are transparent, some are not. The problem is that right now there is a lack of trust generally from the tennis players, both male and female, towards WADA and ITIA and the whole process," Djokovic concluded.