As a general rule – particularly in the modern game – professional footballers are extremely clean cut when it comes to what they are prepared to put in their bodies. Gone are the days when it was acceptable to drink heavily or take drugs the night before a big game. Such are the demands of the game these days that it would be too easy to identify anyone suffering from the effects of a hangover or a comedown – but that doesn’t mean some footballers don’t fall foul of temptation.
Every now and again, whether it be through a momentary lapse in concentration or through prolonged abuse, footballers will be caught out consuming or using substances they shouldn’t – and that includes drugs. We list ten footballers who were not only caught using drugs, but who were banned from the game for doing so.
Edgar Davids, who is now 42, only officially retired from professional football in 2014, after having ended his career as player-manager of lowly English team Barnet. But his career was in jeopardy as far back as 2001 when he tested positive for the banned steroid Nandrolone during his stint at Juventus. The Dutch midfielder was expected to be banned for 16 months, which would have seen him miss the 2002 World Cup.
However, Davids appealed against the ruling and it resulted in the reduced punishment of a four-month ban. The midfielder had been fighting for the cancellation of the suspension by claiming that homeopathic medicines were to blame for the high levels of nandrolone in his system.
Deco
The case of Deco is a somewhat unique one, in the sense that his ban came after he had retired, but he still chose to appeal it. The former Portugal, Porto, Chelsea and Barcelona midfielder spent his final playing days at Fluminense in Brazil and retired in August of 2013, just shy of his 36th birthday.
He had tested positive for traces of furosemide – a diuretic that can be used to mask traces of other substances – in March. But he kept playing until four days prior to his retirement, with the ban officially being implemented after that.
Deco insisted that the positive test was the result of a contaminated vitamin supplement and pleaded his innocence, hoping to overturn the ruling in spite of the fact that he had already stopped playing and the ban essentially wouldn’t have even happened.
Diego Maradona
Without question, the most high-profile case of a footballer being banned for drugs comes in the form of Argentina legend Diego Maradona – and in his case it happened twice. Maradona was first banned from football in 1991, whilst playing for Napoli in Italy, when he tested positive for cocaine. He served a 15-month ban and left the club in disgrace to sign for for Sevilla in Spain.
Three years later, Maradona was banned from the game again – this time whilst a Newell’s Old Boys player – after failing a drug test for ephedrine doping during the 1994 World Cup. He played two games in that tournament before being sent home as a result of his test proving positive.
Given that he’s one of the greatest players of all time, one has to wonder just how great his legacy would have been without such scandal.
Saido Berahino
Saido Berahino has been the hot topic of conversation recently and the media attention surrounding the issue of footballers and drugs stems from the Stoke City forward’s current situation.
In the wake of his recent transfer from West Bromwich Albion to Stoke City for £12m, it was revealed that Berahino had served an 8 week suspension around the start of the current campaign. This was issued by the FA for failing a drugs test, believed to be party drug MDMA, though the player has now claimed that a drink of his was “spiked”.
The incident was kept quiet for several months by West Brom and the FA, until it was made public prior to the two teams playing each other in the Premier League.
The way in which the news immediately broke out following his transfer, after being kept secret for so long, angered Stoke boss Mark Hughes. This sparked a war of words between Hughes and Albion manager Tony Pulis.