CAS clears Gasquet of doping

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) yesterday cleared French tennis player Richard Gasquet of doping and dismissed appeals by sports authorities for a tougher penalty.

International sport's top court acknowledged that the 23-year-old was likely to have been inadvertently contaminated with a minute trace of cocaine when he kissed a woman in a Miami night club in March.

"The player has been exonerated from any fault or negligence and the CAS has dismissed the appeals filed by the ITF (International Tennis Federation) and WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency)," the court said in a statement.

The former world top 10 player tested positive for cocaine during the Miami Masters in March and was provisionally suspended in May before serving a two-and-a-half month retroactive ban.

Instead, the ITF and WADA wanted him to be hit with a ban of one or two years.

The Lausanne-based court's arbitrators said that a doping offence was correctly reported because of the presence of a "minusucle" quantity of cocaine in Gasquet's urine sample.

However, they upheld Gasquet's contention that he was contaminated through kissing and concluded that he could not be blamed.