Patrick Mouratoglou takes responsibility for Simona Halep’s doping scandal. In a statement published on his Instagram account, Mouratoglou blamed his staff and himself for offering Simona the contaminated substance.
According to his statement, even though he couldn’t possibly know that the collagen his staff administered to Simona was contaminated, he still feels responsible.
Patrick Mouratoglou on Simona Halep’s Doping Scandal – Full Statement
I feel confident for the future of Simona with her appeal to the CAS because it’s an independent tribunal. We have been able to establish where the contamination comes from. So we proposed her to take collagen, and we brought her collagen from a company. This collagen happened to be contaminated. There is no way to know it, but I feel responsible for what happened because it’s my team, so me basically, who brought her this collagen
We have done all possible tests to establish that we are talking about contamination. I’m very confident that this independent tribunal will recognize the fact that she never did doping, she is a victim, and she has to come back to the court and be able to compete as soon as possible.
It opened my eyes on the fact that any athlete can become contaminated tomorrow because apparently, this happens more and more. Products (which) are supposed to be clean, happen to be contaminated. We’re talking about extremely low levels of something. When I say extremely low, it’s extremely low, so it has zero effect. But, it happens you have in your system something that shouldn’t be there that makes you positive to an anti-doping test. And this is terrible because you are completely innocent, your reputation is impacted, hurt by the fact that your name has to do with doping even though you didn’t do any doping. Your career is stopped for a period of time that is extremely long. It can affect your whole career, it affects your reputation for a very unfair reason because you have done nothing.
So it opened my eyes that it can happen to anyone, and the companies that you decide to go with for supplements, you have to be sure at 100% that this cannot happen.
Patrick Mouratoglou taking responsibility for Simona Halep’s doping scandal in an Instagram post
Patrick Mouratoglou was Simona’s coach at the time the scandal occurred and he had been working with Simona for 6 months. Rumour has it Mouratoglou is also the reason for which Simona and her former husband chose to divorce, but this is just a rumour that the tabloid local media in Romania published at that time, never confirmed by either of the parties.
Simona Halep was suspended in October 2022 by the WTA following a positive test during the American Open. In September this year, the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) announced that former Wimbledon and French Open winner Simona Halep was handed a four-year suspension following two anti-doping rule breaches.
Mouratoglou’s statements come a little bit too late, as some say. His admission of the guilt might not be able to help Simona during her appeal, but at least could clean Simona’s reputation.
Simona Halep is currently waiting for a decision from TAS-CAS, the sports tribunal which is the last court to judge the case. If the decision at TAS is favourable, Simona could play again in the WTA after a one-year unfair suspension.
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