The dope samples of cricketers that will be collected for the 13th season of the IPL will be sent to Spain’s Barcelona laboratory for testing, informed the national anti-doping Agency (NADA). The first batch of dope controversy; officers will leave for UAE on 12th of September. The tournament is being played across three cities of the emirates: Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah.
This is the first time that Barcelona’s “Catalonian Antidoping Laboratory’ will be engaged by the NADA testing in any sports discipline. The world anti-doping Agency (WADA) suspended the NADA testing laboratory in August 2019 after which they have been sending the samples for analysis to Qatar’s Doha laboratory.
However, the Barcelona laboratory has been roped in because the UAE’s National Anti-Doping Organisation (NADO) is contracted with the Catalonian lab. NADA wanted to send the samples to Doha due to its cost-effectiveness as the cost of one urine sample test was 120 dollars whereas it will ten times higher in Spain.
It is reported that due to the high-cost NADA is only doing 20 in-competition test samples and will later do 30 out of competition samples. This definitely has raised some eyebrows. Three separate teams of NADA officials and DCO’s have been made with five members each ( one senior NADA official, two lead DCO’s and two local chaperones provided by UAE’s NADO ). These three teams will travel to the UAE in batches.
