LAUSANNE: Chinese swimmer Sun Yang was banned for eight years on Friday and will miss the 2020 Tokyo Olympics because he broke anti-doping rules in a late-night incident in which a blood sample container was smashed with a hammer.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport found the three-time Olympic champion guilty of refusing to cooperate with sample collectors during a visit to his home in September 2018 that turned confrontational.

In a rare hearing in open court in November, evidence was presented of how a security guard, instructed by Sun’s mother, broke the casing around a vial of his blood. The swimmer lit the early-hours scene with his mobile phone.

The athlete failed to establish that he had a compelling justification to destroy his sample collection containers and forego the doping control when, in his opinion, the collection protocol was not in compliance, the CAS panel of three judges agreed in a unanimous verdict.

China’s greatest ever swimmer, and one of its biggest sports stars, had asked CAS for a public trial.

A 10-hour hearing broadcast on the courts website showed Sun to be evasive at times under questioning that was hampered by severe translation issues between Chinese and English. The CAS panels verdict was delayed until all parties got a verified translation.

The 6-foot, 7-inch Sun, the first Chinese swimmer to win Olympic gold, has long been a polarising figure in the pool.

Rivals branded him a drug cheat at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, and two competitors refused to stand with him on medal podiums at the 2019 world championships.

Now banned until February 2028, the 28-year-old Sun cannot defend his 200m freestyle title in Tokyo.

The World Anti-Doping Agency went to CAS after a FINA tribunal only warned Sun. The first ruling was that anti-doping protocol was not followed, making the samples invalid, and cited doubts about credentials shown to him by the sample collection team.

“WADA ... is satisfied that justice in this case has been rendered,” the body’s director general Olivier Niggli said in a statement.

Sun can now appeal to Switzerland’s supreme court, but on narrow procedural grounds. His lawyers have already had three federal appeals dismissed on legal process issues.

WADA requested a ban of between two and eight years for a second doping conviction. Sun served a three-month ban in 2014 imposed by Chinese authorities after testing positive for a stimulant that was banned at the time. The ban was not announced until after it ended.

That first case led to criticism of FINA for appearing to protect one of the sport’s biggest stars in a key market.

The Chinese Swimming Association (CSA) expressed its “deep regret” at the CAS ruling, reiterating Sun’s defence that the doping testers who went to his home were not qualified to do the job.

The CSA said the testers were “personnel without professional training and legal qualification to collect athlete samples, and the activity was illegal and invalid”.

“We support Sun Yang to continue to safeguard his legitimate rights and interests by legal means,” it said. “At the same time, it is hoped that WADA, sports organisations and doping inspection agencies will improve and perfect the rules, strictly implement the rules, including the certification requirements for doping inspectors and not ignore the legitimate rights of athletes.”

Sun never missed a major event while banned in 2014. He added 200m gold at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics to the historic 400 and 1,500 titles he took in London four years earlier.

He won a total of 11 golds in five straight world championships from 2011 to 2019, at each freestyle distance from 200 to 1,500. At three Asian Games from 2010 to 2018, he won nine gold medals.

CAS ruled that Sun’s world championship results should stand because he passed dope tests before and after the aborted 2018 control.

There was also no evidence that the swimmer may have engaged in doping activity since then.

Published in Dawn, February 29th, 2020