Hair testing is virtually certain to be introduced within English cricket as the sport tries to improve its drug detection programmes.
A coroner’s court was told yesterday that Surrey player Tom Maynard (above), 23, was a habitual user of cocaine and ecstasy and had taken a cocktail of both drugs and alcohol the night he died on train tracks in Wimbledon last June.
The coroner, Fiona Wilcox, ended the inquest by asking cricket officials to introduce the use of hair analysis to test for illicit drugs, and the sport’s leading figures are likely to act on her advice.
Standard Sport revealed yesterday the England and Wales Cricket Board were considering a new policy that would involve out-of-competition tests for recreational drugs, which could start this summer. Now Angus Porter, chief executive of the Professional Cricketers’ Association, confirmed that examining hair samples is firmly on the agenda.
“It [hair testing] is a logical thing for us to do,” said Porter. “It shows behaviour over a longer period of time, so is less hit and miss than urine testing.”
Surrey's academy players were due to attend a pre-scheduled educational session in Guildford this evening, led by officials from the county and the England and Wales Cricket Board, after completing their training session.
Porter told Sky Sports the extent of Maynard’s drug taking was “a surprise” but insisted: “It is not indicative of a wide-scale epidemic. While I can’t be complacent, I would say the problems in cricket are pretty well reflective of the problems in society as a whole. Most of the tests are in-competition and there are about 200 each year. Their primary focus is to detect performance-enhancing drugs. We’ll look very seriously at an increase in testing.
“If someone is caught taking recreational drugs it’s a matter for counselling and treatment rather than punishment. If we are going to test more players on more occasions, we need to do so knowing the results will be treated in confidence and they will be given help.”
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