This column has zero tolerance for cheats. That includes those of the doping variety; the epidemic of divers who plague football pitches; and rugby forwards who erupt from line-outs as if struck by a freight train (Andy Haden-style) when no contact has occurred, hoping to gain a penalty.
It's with horror we note reports of children practising diving skills, trying to perfect this black art in order to secure penalties and the yellow and red-carding of rivals.
If FIFA and UEFA were more proactive in penalising such behaviour, kids would not copy the antics of over-paid "role models".
But let's jump off that particular soap box. On the opposite side of the scales from a distaste for cheats is a pathological hatred of injustice.
I have considerable respect for Richard Pound, the Canadian lawyer and International Olympic Committee member who's headed the World Anti-Doping Agency for seven years. His Jesuitical pursuit of those who would micro-wave their success by drug abuse marks him as doping's witchfinder general.
However, for global anti-doping to be seen to work, justice has to be absolutely transparent. So we learn with astonishment of Pound's design on the presidency of the Swiss-based Court of Arbitration for Sport.
When he steps down from WADA in November, he would like to become president of the highest court of appeal in sport. "It's closer to what I actually do for a living than anything that I've ever done for the IOC," he said this week. "I'd certainly be willing to do it."
CAS handles some 200 cases a year, by no means all on doping, but I doubt if I am alone in finding Pound's submission inappropriate. How could one expect impartiality from CAS with Pound at its head?
It would be like having Judge Jefferies presiding on a hanging appeal. Pound's impartiality would be constantly challenged, to the detriment of CAS. And Pound's demonstrable integrity over the years would risk being tarnished.
His crusading zeal at WADA has sometimes made me uneasy - ready to condemn without appropriate evidence. I'm delighted to see sport rid of cheats, but banning athletes on hearsay evidence from other defaulters smacks of the Gestapo. It has led critics to accuse him of prejudging cases and smearing athletes without adequate proof. The IOC ethics commission told Pound to be more "careful" following allegations he made against seven-times Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.
During his WADA tenure, one of Pound's associates was Dr Arne Ljungqvist, a member of the IOC medical commission, and also chairman of the medical commission of the International Amateur Athletics Federation. At WADA he was for some time chair of the health, medicine, and research committee. In that capacity the Swede offered grants of $5m a year. One of these was to establish normal levels for various substances in urine. Among those was nandrolone, routinely found in nutrition substances, and which caused Scottish European champion sprinter Dougie Walker to be banned for two years.
Walker's legal advisers sought to question the IAAF on naturally-occurring nandrolone levels. Ljung-qvist said no further data was required. The IAAF knew it all.
Yet shortly after, Ljungqvist was happily offering millions of dollars to discover what he claimed he already knew. Pound, of course, was head of WADA at the time, and the buck must stop with him. It suggests he does not care if justice is done. His attitude has appeared to mirror Lord Braxfield. Potential innocence of those who appeared before the Edinburgh judge was met with the comment: "Ye'll be nane the waur of a guid hingin'." Such concepts of justice are inappropriate today.
A former Olympic finallist and Commonwealth gold medal swimmer, Pound seemed to have grasped the notion that athletes are bigger than the Olympic movement. He has served on the International Olympic Committee since 1978, and done two terms as vice president. He has been a lawyer since 1968, and one would think he would understand the notion of conflict of interest. Though he does say he would not sit on any case that had been handled in his time at WADA.
"I think I'm of the few practising lawyers in the IOC these days who actually get up in court," he said. "It's a natural progression. You go from being a lawyer to being a judge."
Not quite. Advocates and barristers routinely become prosecutors in the Scottish and English legal systems. However, those too loud on controversial matters can usually kiss goodbye to prospects of elevation to the bench. The reputation of Donald Findlay QC is unlikely ever to permit him to sit in judgment. But Colin Campbell QC, former dean of the Faculty of Advocates, has preserved so anodyne a profile that all controversy has been avoided. He's recently been shadowing, and is in the process of stepping up to the High Court bench.
Jacques Rogge, the IOC president, seems already to have judged the Canadian: "Dick Pound is an excellent president of WADA, and will leave a very positive legacy. Unfortunately, he has made many enemies among international federations and certain sports organisations. We asked him to be more prudent in his comments on on-going cases . . ."
A single candidate is to be put to the IOC executive in Beijing next month. We wouldn't put a penny on Pound.
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