ANOTHER VICTIM OF THE "SPORTING PLAGUE"

No matter how much you feed a wolf, he will still look towards the forest - the old Russian proverb has proved to be true again, but in a slightly different way. However strong the measures against the top "sporting" infection - doping - it still affects national sports.

One of the leading practitioners of Azerbaijani judo, Nicat Sixalizada, who was competing for a medal of the forthcoming licensed world championships in Brazil, has become yet another victim of the sporting plague. Nicat Sixalizada might have failed in his attempt to win an Olympic place at the Brazil championship, but he had an excellent chance of qualifying for the Beijing Olympics through the European Olympic ranking, where he lies in fifth place. According to procedure, the top nine judo players of Europe will receive tickets to the Olympics. Now the Olympic prospects of Nicat Sixalizada may be quashed because he is facing disqualification for life. The Azerbaijani judo player has been the focus of a doping row for the second time, which, according to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), threatens him with banishment from the sport for life.

Punishment in the offing 

We recall that Nicat Sixalizada was first caught out two years ago, but it was established then that he had not been using a powerful drug; this helped him receive only a year-long ban. Now it has been discovered that he was taking furosemide, a powerful remedy also known to be a disguising agent, which can conceal the consumption of more powerful and prohibited medical preparations.

"Last time we were treated with sympathy and Nicat was disqualified for only one year. Now he is facing a life-long ban from competition. We are hoping for a two-year ban because no steroids have been found in his body. If he had been caught with anabolic substances, he would have been disqualified for life," the head coach of the national judo team, Agayar Axundzada, has told R+.

However, the doping scandal could have been averted if, according to the coach, Nicat Sixalizada had told the national federation that he had been taking a powerful diuretic agent. "The use of preparations such as furosemide should be brought to the attention of the federation which, in its turn, has to inform representatives of WADA," Axundzada said. "In reality, we use banned agents when sportsmen receive injuries or other traumas. However, we always notify the international bodies. For instance, Mehman Azizov, who, together with Nicat Sixalizada took the doping test in the June training session in Minsk, had warned WADA representatives that he had been given some pain-killing injections. As a result, no problems emerged later with Mehman Azizov's sample. Nicat failed to inform us of that. As a result, we have to hope for a two-year ban. It is already clear that he is certain to miss the licensed World Cup and the Beijing Olympics. The fact that punishment will follow is beyond doubt and time will tell how severe it will be."

"I took no dope"

Nicat Sixalizada is certainly denying any possibility that he had been taking drugs. "I did not take any banned medical agents," Nicat Sixalizada has told R+. "I have been found with drugs for the second time, but while in the first instance it happened through lack of knowledge on my part, in this particular case I did not take any banned preparations. There is strict control over that. And I myself understand what the implications may be if it is discovered that I was taking drugs. Also, furosemide is said to be a diuretic agent, but considering the fact that my sample was taken in June of this year, when there was no competition going on, there was simply no need for me to take it. Why would I want to lose weight in training? My sample was taken during training and I wasn't even informed of that. A doping sample was also taken from Mehman Azizov. If I did not take any banned preparations, their traces could have appeared in my sample from outside. There is nothing else that comes to my mind."

We recall that Greek-Roman wrestler Xusamaddin Racabov was earlier accused of taking banned agents. His disqualification is due to expire on 1 September 2007. Free-style wrestler Xizir Durqayev, weight-lifters Nizami Pasayev and Natiq Hasanov, as well as football player Sergey Sokolov, have also all been disqualified.

Unfortunately, we see yet again that Azerbaijani sportsmen seem to have learned nothing from previous lessons and are again involved in doping rows, although the Ministry of Youth and Sport pledged early this year that it would exercise strict control over the medical agents the sportsmen use. Regrettably, the situation has not changed much. The requests and demands have had no effect and Azerbaijan seems to have lost one of its most talented and promising sportsmen, who, in fact, won the youth world championship last year. We need more radical measures to put an end to doping scandals involving Azerbaijani sportsmen. Otherwise, there will soon be no-one to win medals in international competitions for Azerbaijan.