Collingwood players accept two-year doping bans

Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley will keep in touch with banned players Lachie Keeffe and Josh Keeffe, saying they must decide on their AFL futures.

The pair declared they would never knowingly take a performance enhancing drug.

Keeffe, 25, and Thomas, 23, announced they would not challenge the Asada charge tabled against them for a positive test. They will serve two-year bans, backdated to start in March 2015, and have accordingly been delisted.

The pair tested positive in February, and had been provisionally suspended since March.

Collingwood CEO Gary Pert confirmed the pair had been delisted but that the Magpies had committed to redrafting them as rookies at the end of the season, if they were available.

“We hope that others will learn from our mistakes”. “The past few months have been really hard not to play… for the club that gave us that opportunity…”

“We take full responsibility for our mistakes and we accept the consequences”, he said.

“We hope that an error of judgment does not become a life sentence”.

While Magpies Keeffe and Thomas have admitted to taking an illicit drug out of competition that, unbeknown to them, contained clenbuterol – a performance-enhancing drug in sport banned at all times – Saad’s positive came via a protein powder containing methyl synephrine HCL.

“Their decisions will cost them two years of playing AFL football, the game they’ve loved and have dreamed of playing every since they were young boys”, he said.

Pert said the case of Thomas and Keeffe would be a “wake-up call to the industry”, saying players must now consider the consequences on their career of taking illicit drugs.

“The decision to take an illicit drug which, up until now, would have held no consequences in some sports and in the AFL seen an anonymous strike recorded could now result in a major sanction or the end of your career”.

“[A] review of the AFL’s Illicit Drug Policy that is underway is not only warranted but change is necessary”. He said the club believes more accountability and harsher penalties were needed.

The pair think the clenbuterol was in illicit substances they had taken during a night out.

Rookie listed, Saad, 26, is uncontracted next year and has not played a senior match for the Saints since round four, but he said he is “hopeful” of being re-contracted and that the club and his agent have commenced talks along those lines.

Both footballers must take part in drug-testing programs during their absence. Marsh agreed with Pert regarding the now blurred lines between illegal and performance-enhancing drugs and the warning this should send to players.