Fernando Verdasco handed two-month doping ban from competitive tennis in provisional suspension

Veteran Spanish tennis player Fernando Verdasco has been provisionally suspended for two months after testing positive for the drug methylphenidate, it has been confirmed.

Verdasco has accepted a voluntary ban until January 8, 2023, after his urine sample collected at an ATP Challenger event in Rio de Janeiro in February was found to have contained the banned substance.

The former world No. 7 admitted the Anti-Doping Rule Violation in a statement.

Verdasco explained that he had been diagnosed with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder. To treat the condition, he had used methylphenidate as a TUE with a prescription from his doctor.

Crucially, however, he had neglected to renew the TUE when it expired. Despite the fact that he has since been handed a renewed TUE for the medication by the World Anti-Doping Agency, he has still been provisionally suspended.

“The ITIA accepts that the player did not intend to cheat, that his violation was inadvertent and unintentional, and that he bears no significant fault or negligence for it,” the ITIA statement read.

“In the specific circumstances of this case, based on the player’s degree of fault the Tennis Anti-Doping Programme allows for the applicable period of ineligibility to be reduced from two years to two months.”

Verdasco’s best result in a Grand Slam singles draw came back in 2009 when he reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open. He also progressed through to the last eight at both Wimbledon and the US Open in his career.