New Delhi: Former New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum has admitted that he tested positive for a banned substance during the 2016 edition of the IPL but insisted that it was not a ‘failed drug test’ as he had procured a retroactive Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) certificate to ‘clear his name’.
In the WADA list of 2016, there was one ‘Adverse Analytical Finding’ in cricket in India but BCCI never revealed the name of the cricketer while there were rumours of it being a high profile player.
Interestingly, BCCI had revealed that Pradeep Sangwan, Yusuf Pathan and Abhishek Gupta had tested positive for banned substances during various seasons of domestic cricket.
McCullum tested positive while playing for Gujarat Lions and was summoned for random test after the April 27, 2016 match against Delhi Daredevils in Delhi.
I have no guilt or remorse about it (the excess amount of salbutamol in his sample) because I needed a puff of my inhaler at that time
Brendon McCullum
A report in a cricket-specific website said, “The former New Zealand captain has asthma and, in light of heavy pollution in Delhi at the time, he needed more than the usual dose of his medicine.
“As a result, McCullum’s urine sample was found to have exceeded the allowable limit for ‘salbutamol’, a drug that is a part of inhalers used to treat asthma. The BCCI approached McCullum with these findings following which he secured a retroactive therapeutic use exemption from a panel of independent medical experts in Sweden to close the matter and clear his name.”
McCullum said that he felt the need to come out with his version as he heard some rumours about his dope test.
“There was a bit of a process to go through to make sure they had all the information and ticked off the areas they wanted to see, but we went through it all and (the BCCI) were actually pretty good to work with, in the end,” McCullum was quoted as saying by ‘stuff.co.nz’ Saturday. “I certainly don’t see it as a failed drug test,” he added.
