The Crisis of Ethics in Sports

The past few months have indeed been hard to endure for avid sports fans like me. Beginning with the Tour de France and culminating in the sordid saga of the Pakistan cricket team’s alleged ball tampering and Darrel Hair’s subsequent moral capitulation, the integrity of sporting heroes has never been more seriously questioned. For starters, dozens of cyclists were disqualified from participating in the TdF for being possible beneficiaries of an illegal blood transfusion program. A reigning Olympic 100m gold medallist and joint world record holder was found guilty of committing a second doping offence. The Old Lady of Italian football, Juventus, was demoted to the Serie B for her involvement in match fixing. And the event that shook me the most, Floyd Landis’ positive drug test. In one fall swoop, he tore to shreds all the respect he gained from his now disgraced epic ride.

However, all is not lost. I still believe that there are a lot of unsung sportsmen who would much rather taste defeat than cheat to enter into the limelight. And I respect them as much as I admire a Tiger Woods or a Roger Federer who dominate the competition through their sheer magical abilities. Here is to hoping that all sportsmen soon learn to embrace the true ideals of sport!