Where is the sanity in sports?

There seems no end in sight when it comes to fair play and integrity in sports. The name of the game today is to win at all costs or by any means necessary.

Gone are the days when someone would cheat in a match in some form or fashion to get an advantage over his/her opponents.{{more}}

Whilst this is still existent, we have moved into the high-tech forms, inclusive of match fixing, spot fixing and most damning, the scourge of doping.

Over the past few years, the international world has reeled off a multitude of events which have indicated that we have lost our way and most of all, the sanity which sports should engender and foster.

Football’s world governing body FIFA was thrown into confusion in May when 14 officials were named and indicted after a US led probe.

Caribbean football personnel in Jeffrey Webb and Austin “Jack” Warner did not evade the dragnet of the investigations.

Racketeering, kickbacks, money laundering, bribes, name it, the plot widened; as we say in local parlance, “the boley buss.”

At the centre of the fallout was the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 tournaments to Russia and Qatar, respectively.

From there on in, more and more is being unearthed, with the most recent being the ban of head honcho of FIFA Sepp Blatter and his long-standing general secretary Jerome Valcke and UEFA boss Michel Platini.

In 2011, the region also faced its own spotlight when the cash for vote scandal erupted, following a meeting in Trinidad, involving then prospective FIFA presidential candidate Mohammed bin Hammam. Injurious this was to the Caribbean psyche, as we have been viewed as easy targets.

Similarly, the world of athletics has had its fair share of black eyes and jilt.

Scandalous it was that the once famous Lance Armstrong, who, for several years, dominated the Tour de France, was exposed by a United States anti-doping agency for cheating, along with his team.

The disgraced Armstrong later revealed in a television interview with Oprah Winfrey his doping regiment. As a consequence, he was banned for life, relinquishing all titles, as well as repaying some endorsements.

Not to be left out was Canadian Ben Johnson, who found himself stripped naked of his 100m gold medal earned at the Seoul Olympics.

The Seoul 100 metre final has since been described as the world’s dirtiest race, with most of the eight finalists later testing positive or being implicated in drug scandals.

Still in the world of athletics, American Marion Jones, was the winner of five medals, inclusive of three gold at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, only to admit in 2007 that she lied to federal agents about her use of performance enhancing drugs.

This was not all for her, as she spent six months in jail. Her exposure was borne out of the BALCO scandal.

We, here in St Vincent and the Grenadines, were also hit by some unsavoury hit back when in 2005 sprinter Natasha Mayers was banned for two years from the sport.

The US based Mayers tested positive for excessive testosterone against her epitestosterone levels.

This list worldwide in other sporting disciplines has extended over time and has now become almost a given, as with frequency others are caught, charged and banned.

These, however, must pale in comparison with the latest episode, as last week the revelation came that former head of the IOC Lamine Diack is being investigated for allegedly accepting payments of more than £600,000 to cover up doping offences by Russian athletes.

The named allegations against Diack are money laundering and corruption. If the allegations are found to be so against the 82-year-old Diack, this must be the lowest the sport and any sport for that matter could get.

This begs the question as to where are the persons for others to look up to? Who then can be held in high esteem and be counted as trustworthy?

The once looked forward to social enhancement which sports provide to patrons is slowly being devalued by mistrust, scorns and in some cases indifference, as no one can be assured of the next saga.

However, as the trends take root, soon there will be another episode which will make those mentioned above drop lower down the ladder of shameful happenings in sports.