• ATP Tour

Murray calls for anti-doping improvements

ESPN staff
February 4, 2013
Andy Murray lost to Novak Djokovic in the final of last month's Australian Open © AP
Enlarge

Andy Murray has criticised the infrequency of blood tests performed on tennis players and called on his fellow competitors to forge the way forward for the sport.

The British No. 1 questioned whether tennis had a collective 'complacency' towards the issue of doping but accepted that cost was probably a factor as well.

Cycling's reputation has been dragged through the mud recently by the admission of Lance Armstrong to blood doping throughout his seven Tour de France titles.

While Murray insists that the idea doping could be happening in tennis does not cross most fans' minds, he called for more rigorous testing nonetheless.

"Ideally people would be getting tested every other week but it's not cheap," Murray told Sky Sports News. "I've been on the tour for seven, eight years now. I don't know what's gone on in the past, whether it's complacency or purely cost.

"What can we do to make tennis the cleanest sport it can be? Players need to get together and try and find the best way possible as well as all the major organisations that are involved in drug testing, it's as simple as that.

"It's easy when you are growing up to not think that anything like that would go on in your sport and you would hope that it doesn't. But we need to make sure that tennis is as clean as possible and that's by changing the way testing is done."

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
Close

ABOUT COOKIES

To help make this website better, to improve and personalize your experience and for advertising purposes, are you happy to accept cookies and other technologies.

More Info Here Cookie Choices