In a move that was about as hopeless as coming back from 30-0 down with two minutes to play, former Springbok hooker Chiliboy Ralepelle’s desperate attempt to clear his name, has failed. He has been banned for eight years for doping. 

Ralepelle’s sanction is so severe because it was his second positive Test in under 10 years. His only recourse is now to try and have the ban overturned at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Switzerland. It’s unlikely he has any grounds to make a case. 

“Mr Ralepelle tested positive for the banned anabolic agent‚ Zeranol‚ during a Sharks rugby training session on the 17th January 2019‚” the South African Institute for Drug-Free Sport (SAIDS) in a statement on Thursday. 

“The athlete contested the doping charges in front of an Independent Doping Hearing Panel. This panel found the athlete guilty of the doping offence and took into account that it was his second doping offence within a 10-year period. The panel relied on the sanction’s framework in the World Anti-Doping Code that granted them the jurisdiction to hand down an eight-year ban from sport. 

“The athlete lodged an appeal against the ban and also the drug testing process that he was subjected to. An Independent Appeal Panel heard the grounds for appeal. It found that the panel that conducted the hearing in the first instance had not erred in their application of the sanction’s framework in the World Anti-Doping Code. 

“The Appeal Panel therefore upheld the original sanction of eight years. Mr Ralepelle’s ban from sport is backdated to the 17th January 2019 for eight years. If the athlete does not accept the decision‚ he may seek relief at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.” 

Ralepelle captained the SA under-21 team to the 2005 Junior World Championship title, and was also the first black player to captain the Springboks when he led the team in a non-Test against a World XV in 2006. 

The burly hooker, whose career unluckily overlapped with John Smit, Bismarck du Plessis and Adriaan Strauss, was never able to cement a permanent place in the Bok team. 

Whether it was the pressure to perform or desperation to recover from injuries, but Ralepelle has a chequered doping history. 

In 2010 both Ralepelle and Bok team mate Bjorn Basson both failed a doping test for the stimulant methylhexanamine. But they were later cleared by SA Rugby after it was found there was a possibility of some supplements, supplied to the Bok squad, being contaminated. 

In 2014, Ralepelle failed another doping test, this time after traces of the anabolic steroid drostanolone were found in an out-of-competition doping test in France. He was playing for Toulouse at the time. 

Ralepelle was recovering from ankle ligament surgery when that test was conducted. He claimed innocence but in 2015 he was handed a two-year ban for the infringement. 

Ralepelle returned to South Africa and resumed his career at the Sharks. But in January 2019, at another out-of-competition testing conducted in Durban, he was found to have Zeranol in his system. 

The cycle repeated itself with Ralepelle claiming innocence and attacking the doping procedure as well as claiming there was racial bias in the testing. His claim that that doping was racist came at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement. 

“The last few months have been an absolute nightmare for my family and me, but I refuse to be the fall-guy for a corrupt system, one utterly determined to destroy lives and livelihoods of athletes of colour,” Ralepelle said in a statement in July following his original eight-year ban.

“I have dedicated my life to this sport, and should this be the end, then so be it, but if they expect me to just go off quietly into the night, then they have another think coming,” Ralepelle said. 

“I won’t stop until my name is cleared. I do believe that we, as black rugby players, are held to a different standard. Racial inequalities continue to persist in the sport, and I, for one, will continue to fight, so that future generations of the sport don’t have to.” 

It seems that the fight will have to continue at CAS. At this stage it is unclear whether Ralepelle has the financial means to take his case to CAS, which will be costly and lengthy. DM