Czech Tennis Federation bans Korda
Posted: Friday February 05, 1999 03:23 PM
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Under the ban, Korda won't be able to play for the Czech Davis Cup team. Gary M. Prior/Allsport |
PRAGUE, Czech. (Reuters) -- Petr Korda will be banned from playing in or for his home country, the Czech Republic, pending further investigation of his positive dope test at last year's Wimbledon, the Czech Tennis Federation said on Friday.
Under the ban, Korda will not be able to play in professional tournaments in the republic or in the Czech Davis Cup team, Czech news agency CTK reported, quoting the federation's disciplinary commission.
The commission has sent Korda the ruling and invited him to its next meeting, which is still to be scheduled. Korda has left for a tournament in Dubai and was unavailable for comment.
"It is a paradoxical situation. Korda must not play here but can play elsewhere," the agency quoted the federation's General Secretary Karel Papousek as saying.
'The (preliminary) ruling of our commission is based on the fact that we joined the anti-doping charter. The disciplinary code therefore says that a player gets a two-year ban for an offense of this kind," Papousek said.
Last week, Korda won a High Court ruling in London which prevented the International Tennis Federation (ITF) from challenging a ruling by its own disciplinary board. But the ITF has said it will appeal against the High Court ruling.
The ITF board stripped the Czech of his 1998 Wimbledon points and earnings but did not impose the one-year ban called for under ITF rules because of "exceptional circumstances."
Korda's defense was that he did not know how the substance, the banned steroid nandrolone, got into his body.
The ruling sparked outrage. Many players said the positive test on Korda, the 1998 Australian Open champion, should have automatically led to a ban from professional tennis.
Korda, who fell to 75th in the world after losing in the third round at Melbourne last month, has not played Davis Cup since 1997 when he complained about the grueling nature of the event and the Czech federation's management of the team.
The Czechs travel to Belgium for a World Group first round tie in early April.
The player who climbed as high as second in the world in 1998 last played a Czech tournament in October when he lost in the second round of the Czech Indoor Open in Ostrava.
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