Maarten Paes is the starting goalkeeper for Major League Soccer team FC Dallas. Yet he can walk down a busy street in Dallas, Texas, and nobody will notice him.

That is not the case online. Or in Indonesia.

Like his team-mates in the Indonesia national team, Paes is mobbed when he visits the country and has a huge social media following, far bigger than would be expected of a player yet to trouble football’s uppermost echelons.

Paes, 26, was born in the Netherlands but became an Indonesian citizen in April and was shocked by the rapid growth of his socials — he has 1.7million followers on Instagram and 1.2m on TikTok.

“You already know before it happens because you’ve seen it happen to other players. It’s such a huge country and they are all in love with soccer,” Paes says.

The 26-year-old knew he was eligible to play for Indonesia for a couple of years but at the end of last year, the team reached out to him again. “At that time, my grandmother was declining in her health,” he says.

“She’s from there and I spoke with her a lot about it. It was a thing I could do that would make her smile at the end of her life. That was huge for me. She said, ‘I would really love if you would do that’. So she encouraged me and it was an honour to do it for her.”

After news broke that he was switching to Indonesia, his life changed. “That was when I felt I needed to get a relationship with my social media in a different way, where you can put it away for a while because it can be a little bit overwhelming,” he says. “It’s surreal that suddenly you’re getting adored by so many followers and such big crowds.”

Paes, who represented the Netherlands at youth level, played his first two games for Indonesia during the recent break. He says the goalless draw against Australia, who were 109 places above Indonesia in FIFA’s world rankings, in front of more than 70,000 fans at the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium was eye-opening.

“It was like for the first time it all hit me, how big it is,” he says. “You see it on the internet, you see the numbers and you can’t really wrap your head around it. Then we couldn’t leave the hotel without security.”

Oxford United, who sit ninth in the Championship, England’s second tier, rarely generate big numbers on social media, but in August, a video they posted on Instagram hit 5.2million views.

Australian A-League side Brisbane Roar experienced a similarly curious upturn in engagement across social channels this month too. Like Oxford, Brisbane’s videos posted to Instagram are usually viewed thousands of times. Yet back-to-back videos posted to Instagram garnered 4.5million and 1.7million views for Roar.

The explanation? You’ve guessed it: the summer arrival of two Indonesian soccer superstars, in the form of the national team’s youngsters Marselino Ferdinan and Rafael Struick.

Ferdinan is a 20-year-old attacking midfielder who signed for Oxford from Belgian second-division side Deinze last month. Struick is a 21-year-old forward who joined Brisbane (owned by Indonesian conglomerate Bakrie Group) from ADO Den Haag, in Dutch football’s second tier, this month.

Neither arrived as a household name, at least in Europe or Australia, nor were they from well-known clubs.

Within days of Ferdinan joining Oxford, their follower count on Instagram grew from 83,000 to 226,000. Some of Brisbane’s previous posts received less than 10 replies. Struick’s announcement had 9,000.

This is the Indonesia effect. The country in south-east Asia has a population of more than 280million people and football is the No 1 sport. Cue adoration for national team players and fanaticism online and offline.

To illustrate the point, below are some stats compiled by The Athletic to compare Indonesia’s starting XI with the United States men’s national team’s starting XI — but we’re not looking at expected goals or progressive passing. We’re comparing Instagram followers.

Indonesia’s starting XI for their World Cup qualifier against Australia had a collective Instagram following of 26.9million. The 11 clubs they play for have a combined following of under 10m on the same app.

In comparison, USMNT’s last starting XI from their friendly against New Zealand had a combined following of only 1.4m.

That number could have been higher but Christian Pulisic, the AC Milan forward with 7.8m followers on Instagram, was on the bench.

What comparing the two starting XIs should highlight is the level of support for Indonesian players compared with, for example, a country of more than 335million people that will host the men’s World Cup in 2026.

The only players in the starting XI for Indonesia’s goalless draw with Australia who have fewer followers than the club they play for are Rizky Ridho, who plays centre-back for Indonesian Liga 1 side Persija Jakarta, and Justin Hubner, who is at Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Premier League.

Hubner, 21, joined Wolves’ youth ranks in 2020. He has yet to feature for the senior side and plays the majority of his games at academy level — but with the national team, he is treated like he plays week in and week out for Real Madrid, such is the fanfare he experiences online and in person.

“I can’t leave my hotel (in Indonesia) because there are people waiting for me, running to me. Everywhere I go it’s crazy,” Hubner tells The Athletic. “If I go into a shop and then walk out, there will be maybe 100 people waiting. I’m their idol, so they are waiting for me, for pictures and autographs.”

More on the world of social media and football…

Hubner was born in the Netherlands and played alongside Xavi Simons (an Instagram star as a teenager at Barcelona, he had one million followers before he was 14 and now plays for RB Leipzig) in Dutch youth national teams. With Indonesia once a Dutch colony, a growing number of players in the national team have dual citizenship.

“I had maybe 5,000 followers on Instagram and when the fans realised I had Indonesian blood it went to 30k and now I’m at 2.7million,” says Hubner. “In terms of social media, everything has just grown so fast. Everything from brand deals too. There’s so much coming to me now. It’s a dream.”

The day before speaking to The Athletic, his deal with deodorant firm Rexona was launched. “A lot of team-mates here at Wolves say, ‘Can I change my national team to Indonesia?’, as a joke.

“But the guys here support me and are happy for me. They also want followers because it’s nice to have, but it is not about followers, the important thing is that I’m playing for the national team and what comes with it is really nice.”

Hubner went on loan to Japanese side Cerezo Osaka last season and says there were always Indonesia fans there to watch him, but when he travelled back to England following the two World Cup qualifier games against Saudi Arabia and Australia, there was no welcome party like there would have been at Jakarta airport. He returned to his apartment alone and without the need for security.

“It’s a different world,” Hubner says about his quiet life in Wolverhampton. “When I come back to Europe it is like I am living my own life, no stress. In Indonesia, there is a crazy side. You have no privacy, wherever you go there’s always people recording you, it’s nice but it is also good to get back to your own space and privacy.

“When I landed in Indonesia, I tried to hide myself with a cap and a mask but they recognised me straight away. Even the security and police wanted pictures with me. There was 50 to 60 people who wanted a picture. My family are also quite famous now. I made an Instagram account for my mum and she has nearly 50,000 followers. Everyone recognises her. The first time she went to Indonesia, she was asking why people wanted pictures with her.”

When fans meet Hubner he says it is not uncommon for them to be overawed with emotion. Some have cried. His mother, Brigitte, has received direct messages from fans who dream of marrying her son. This star factor is something clubs are trying to tap into.

“Dallas have been noticing it,” goalkeeper Paes says. “There’s been a big boost in terms of engagement for the club. If I play for a club, I like to help them as much as possible because they help me a lot too. My main focus is to keep the balls out of the net for them, but help to build this club, build awareness.”

Oxford, Ferdinan’s new club, are co-owned by Erick Thohir, an Indonesian businessman who helped restore them to the second tier after a 25-year hiatus. Thohir was also appointed head of the Football Association of Indonesia last year and is behind the drive to improve the national team, youth teams and wider football across Indonesia.

“The exciting thing about Marselino is that he is the best young Indonesian talent,” says Thohir. “He’s 20, he’s been playing and training in Belgium.

“We need to be investing in young players at Oxford. He’s young but he has played more than 20 times for our national team, so the Oxford manager wants to give him a chance, and that’s the most important thing.

“If he brings more awareness to Oxford, it is an extra value.

“We want to see an opportunity for any players who can play,” he adds. “So let’s see if Marselino can survive in Oxford because we don’t give any red carpet or VIP treatment. He has to compete.”

(Top photos: Robertus Pudyanto, Mohamed Farag, Zhizhao Wu, Noushad Thekkayil, Getty Images; design: Meech Robinson)

By Rustin Dodd, Zack Meisel and Andy McCullough

When the Tampa Bay Buccaneers snapped a record 26-game losing streak in December 1977, head coach John McKay tried to look on the bright side.

“Three or four plane crashes and we’re in the playoffs,” he said.

It was hard to blame him. The year before, the Bucs had finished 0-14 in their inaugural season, stamping their place among the worst teams in the history of professional sports.

The list includes the winless, the hopeless, and the talentless. One owner traded all of his good players to his other team. This year, the list includes a new applicant: The 2024 Chicago White Sox.

This year, the South Siders set the modern MLB record for the most losses in a season, topping the 1962 New York Mets Friday night with loss No. 121 — and they’re not done yet. Here’s where the White Sox rank among a baker’s dozen of the worst teams ever.

So awful they were forgettable

13. 2011-12 Charlotte Bobcats, NBA, 7-59, .106

Before the season, the Bobcats’ owner sized up his team’s chances this way: “Who knows how good we can be? We’ve got some good pieces that can help us get to the playoffs. I’m not waiting until next year. I think we have a good quality basketball team this year.”

It was a rare airball from perhaps the greatest basketball player who ever lived. Michael Jordan won six NBA Finals MVP awards. His Bobcats won seven regular season games during the 2011-12 season. Jordan flirted with immortality as a player, and then as an owner he oversaw the perhaps most vincible NBA team ever assembled.

Sure, that season was shortened to 66 games because of a lockout, but the Bobcats weren’t exactly trending well toward the end. They dropped their final 23 games. Otherwise, 7-59 might have become 9-73 or 10-72 or, hell, 7-75.

Their seven wins were one-third the total of the next-worst team. Their 87.0 points per game are the lowest by any team in the last 20 years. They lost by double digits 38 times and by at least 20 points on 22 occasions. Their .106 winning percentage is the worst in NBA history. Their head coach, Paul Silas, reportedly shoved forward Tyrus Thomas “toward his locker” after a loss to the Boston Celtics because Thomas had been “fraternizing” with the opposition. — ZM

12. 2011 Tulsa Shock, WNBA, 3-31, .088

When the WNBA’s Detroit Shock relocated to Tulsa for the 2010 season, legendary former Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson took over as head coach. In 2011, the team put a new spin on “40 Minutes of Hell.”

Gutted by departures, the 2011 Shock began the season with a 1-10 record before Richardson resigned. It didn’t get better. Under new coach Theresa Richards, the team finished 3-31, setting a WNBA record for worst winning percentage (.088). The team finished last in points per game, second to last in points allowed, and set a record for consecutive losses (20) — later matched by the 2023 Indiana Fever. “What can I say?” Richards said. “I’m the one in the seat.”

The Shock lasted just four more seasons in Tulsa before moving to Dallas. — RD

Maybe relegation is a good idea

11. 2007-08 Derby County, English Premier League, 1-29-8, .026

In 2023-24, Sheffield United set a Premier League record by allowing 104 goals in 38 games. And yet in terms of sheer awfulness, they can’t touch the Derby County side from 2007-08, which won just one match and accumulated just 11 points, the worst since the league began in 1992.

Manager Billy Davies was out after just 14 matches. His replacement, Paul Jewell, did not experience a win. Neither did anyone during the club’s final 32 matches — a record for top-flight football.

Derby County also set the record for fewest goals (20) and most defeats (29). They were relegated after the season and have never played their way back to the Premier League. As The Athletic’s Duncan Alexander wrote earlier this year, “ … no side will ever go as low as 11 points again, but Derby at least have had the sense to never return.” — RD

There’s no earthly reason they should have been this bad

10. 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers, NBA, 9-73, .110

In his memoir, Tom Van Arsdale, a 6-5 shooting guard who joined the Sixers in January 1973, compared the team to a “burnt, faded, broken-down used lemon with the sticker price so low it was almost offensive.”

The team set the NBA record for losses with 73.

Their head coach was Roy Rubin, a New Yorker who was hired from Long Island University to replace Jack Ramsay, and then lasted just 51 games, finishing with a 4-47 record. In a 2023 story for ESPN, center John Block described Rubin as “a nice guy, but he really, really had a hard time coaching.”

Block later moved to Florida and operated an IHOP restaurant.

Philadelphia had been in a general state of decline since losing Wilt Chamberlain after the 1967-68 season. But it had never been this woeful. The Sixers endured a 14-game losing streak that started in December, snapped the skid on Jan. 7, 1973, and then promptly lost another 20 games in a row.

The best player on the ‘72-73 Sixers was guard Fred Carter, who doubled as the best story. The upbeat Carter, who hung around Philly for four more seasons, was later credited with helping popularize the fist bump with his Sixers teammates. — RD

9. 2003 Detroit Tigers, MLB, 43-119, .265

This could have been the team the 2024 White Sox were chasing, if not for a miraculous recovery in the final week of the season. The Tigers started the season 1-17. By late September, they were 38-118 and on the verge of eclipsing those ’62 Mets as the most pitiful outfit to ever step foot on a modern big-league diamond.

It wasn’t as though this came out of left field. As team architect Dave Dombrowski recalled to The Athletic last year: “We didn’t expect to have a good season, by any means.” As the club reached triple digits in the loss column in late August, though, they started eyeing that Mets record and computing how they could steer clear of it.

With 20 games remaining, they knew they needed six more wins to avoid infamy. With six games remaining, they still needed five more wins. They surged to the finish line, though, and now, they’re merely a footnote in the annals of baseball ineptitude.

“It was almost like winning the World Series,” said outfielder Craig Monroe about that frantic finish to the season, which included Detroit’s biggest comeback win in 38 years. “Doesn’t that sound crazy as hell?”

Why, yes, it does. — ZM

Expansion? How about contraction instead?

8. 1992-93 Ottawa Senators, NHL, 10-70-4, .119

The headline writers at the Ottawa Citizen could not contain their glee when the Senators returned to town after a 56-year absence: “Maybe Rome was built in a day,” the paper declared after the Sens defeated the Montreal Canadiens in the first game of the season. “10,449 fans went wild, and it was magical,” a sub-hed read.

They were wrong about Rome — and they were wrong about the new hometown team.

Ottawa did not win again until its 23rd game. The rest of the season went about the same way. The team won just once — once! — on the road. And that happened in the 81st game. The club finished with 24 points, 34 points behind the Hartford Whalers in the Adams division. Not ideal. — AM

7. 1974-75 Washington Capitals, NHL, 8-67-5, .100

When the Washington Capitals and Kansas City Scouts joined the NHL for the 1974-75 season and proceeded to have two of the worst years in league history, a general opinion formed around the league: Expansion was a mistake.

The Scouts were awful. The Capitals were even worse, finishing a shocking 8-67-5, including an incredible 1-39 on the road. The Capitals allowed a record 446 goals. They lost four games by at least 10 goals. The reason was simple enough: The NHL had tipped the scales against the new franchises, allowing the league’s incumbent teams to protect all of their good players.

“It’s not fair,” Capitals GM Milt Schmidt told The New York Times in 1974. “We paid $6 million to join the league, and look how little the other teams have left for us.”

When the Capitals did win their one and only road game, they returned to the dressing room and paraded a trash can around the room like it was the Stanley Cup. — RD

6. 1976 Tampa Buccaneers, NFL, 0-14, .000

Head Coach John McKay and his Bucs didn’t have much, but they did have those distinctive uniforms. (Focus on Sport / Getty Images)

Hamstrung by inequitable expansion rules, the Buccaneers had a roster of aging veterans (many of whom would injure their hamstrings) and unproven young players. They set a new standard for professional incompetence.

The Bucs did not score until their third game and did not record a touchdown until their fourth. They did manage to place 17 players on the injured reserve, an unofficial record. In all the Bucs were outscored 412- to-125, including a 42-0 loss at Pittsburgh and a 34-0 loss at the Jets. And before the season opener, head coach John McKay famously got lost in the Astrodome tunnels.

The creamsicle uniforms were nice, but the team plane was not. In an NFL Films segment, future Hall of Famer Lee Roy Selmon — as a rookie, perhaps the team’s lone bright spot — relayed a story about how the Bucs’ old plane, which always seemed to break down, was leased from the owner of a chainsaw company, complete with a chainsaw logo on the side: “Right away,” he said, “I was a little worried.” — RD

5. 1962 New York Mets, MLB, 40-120, .250

“Can’t anybody here play this game?” Mets manager Casey Stengel famously asked.

The answer was no. (Well, Frank Thomas and Richie Ashburn were decent.)

The Mets finished 40-120, setting the modern era record for losses. Their exploits were legendary: Their pitchers posted a team ERA of 5.04. They committed 210 errors. Nearly 25 percent of their wins came during a 9-3 spurt in May. Nineteen players would never play another season in the majors. Perhaps no moment symbolized the 1962 Mets like the day Marv Throneberry missed first base against the Cubs while hitting a potential game-winning RBI triple with two outs. When the Cubs appealed to first and Throneberry was called out, erasing the runs, the umpire had a message for an upset Stengel. “Casey, I hate to tell you this,” he said, “but he also missed second.” — RD

The 0-16 Club

The 2017 Cleveland Browns found themselves looking up at pretty much every team ever. (Patrick Smith / Getty Images)

4. 2017 Cleveland Browns, NFL, 0-16, .000

Hue Jackson guaranteed the Browns would not repeat their 1-15 record from 2016. If that happened, he vowed, he would plunge into the choppy, chilly waters of Lake Erie.

And he was right! The Browns did not produce another 1-15 showing in 2017. No, they went winless.

They ranked last in the league in points per game and second-to-last in points allowed per game. All season, they started a raw second-round pick from Notre Dame, DeShone Kizer, who tossed twice as many interceptions as touchdown passes. Only one player, the bac”kup running back, recorded 400 or more receiving yards.

When the season ended, fans organized a parade to protest the franchise for its annual incompetence. They marched around the stadium in subzero temperatures, shouting: “What do we want? Watchable football! When do we want it? Now!” Some Browns fans sported No. 16 jerseys with the name “Owen” on the back. Some Lions fans made the trip to commiserate with the new members of the winless club.

Jackson finally waded into Lake Erie the following June. “It’s going to be a cleansing of our organization,” he declared. He was fired four months later, leaving Cleveland with a 3-31-1 record. — ZM

3. 2008 Detroit Lions, NFL, 0-16, .000

The question, in retrospect, is one of the funniest in the modern history of American sports press conferences. The Lions had just lost, 42-7, giving up more than 30 points for the 12th time in 15 games. The team’s defensive coordinator, Joe Barry, just so happened to be the son-in-law of head coach Rod Marinelli. As Marinelli spoke to the media, Detroit News columnist Rob Parker could not resist.

“On a light note,” Parker ventured, “do you wish your daughter would have married a better defensive coordinator?”

Enough time has passed that hopefully we can admit it: That’s a good zinger.

The Lions were the first NFL team to ever go winless in a 16-game season. The feat was matched nine years later by the Cleveland Browns. But the 2017 Browns were outscored by 176 points. The 2008 Lions? Try a point-differential of negative-249.

Marinelli, understandably, did not take it well. Parker dealt with plenty of blowback; he was suspended by the newspaper and eventually resigned. But he remains a fixture in the sports media landscape. Marinelli was never a head coach again. — AM

The Applicant

2. 2024 Chicago White Sox, MLB, record unknown

There’s an old adage, often attributed to Mark Twain, that says humor equals tragedy plus time.

There will come a time in the future when the 2024 White Sox will be remembered in a way that most baseball teams are not. Many of the teams on this list have not been assembled or competing for decades, but their exploits will never die.

Two players colliding as the opposing announcer declares the moment “full White Sox?” Andrew Benintendi likening the team to a “dead horse?” A 21-game losing streak that tied the AL record?

At some point, these will be colorful and funny details.

It just takes time.

The White Sox had a 4-40 stretch. They lost 27 of 28 at home. They became the first team since the 1916 A’s to fall 81 games under .500.

You can go on.

History will judge the 2024 White Sox. But they are not the worst team of all time. — RD

The Cleveland Spiders’ legacy lives on. (Quinn Harris / Getty Images)

The Worst Team of All Time

1. 1899 Cleveland Spiders, MLB, 20-134, .130

Frank and Stanley Robison owned both the Cleveland Spiders and St. Louis Perfectos, and believing that St. Louis was the better bet to make money going forward, they stripped the Cleveland roster of all its talent and stacked St. Louis instead. Before the season, they swapped Cy Young and other stars with players who did not eventually have distinguished awards named after them. And so the Spiders became the most futile baseball team of all time, a sad-sack bunch destined to fail before they ever took the field.

The Spiders endured a 24-game losing streak. They lost 40 of their last 41 games. They finished the season with a run differential of minus-723. They trailed first-place Brooklyn by 84 games in the final standings. During the summer-long funeral procession, the Cleveland Plain Dealer stopped referring to them as the Spiders and instead dubbed them the Cleveland Exiles or the Cleveland Forsakens.

Following a 4-2 Spiders win on Aug. 25 against the New York Giants, the Plain Dealer printed: “An eighth wonder has come into the world and the Colossus of Rhodes, the Pyramids, the Statue of Zeus and the rest of the seven wonders had better look to their laurels. Cleveland has won another game. How it happened is beyond explanation. … They put up such a sharp, fast game that the 200 people who had gone out to League Park to get a little fresh air and take a quiet siesta were soon aroused to something very close to enthusiasm.” The Spiders wouldn’t win again for three-and-a-half weeks.

Fans bailed on supporting the intentionally depleted roster, so the club wound up traveling for most of its games. They embarked on a 50-game trip in July and August, on which they went 6-44. Even the team’s uniforms stunk, according to the Plain Dealer, which wrote: “Now they are obliged to wear the castoff uniforms of the St. Louis Browns, all of which are plenteously adorned with patches.”

The Spiders were promptly booted from the National League and disbanded. Cleveland baseball was reborn in 1901 as a charter member of the American League with a franchise that still stands today as the Guardians. — ZM

(Illustration by Meech Robinson / The Athletic; Photos: Quinn Harris / Getty Images, Gregory Shamus / Getty Images, David T. Foster III / Charlotte Observer / MCT)

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has announced that it will appeal against the “no fault or negligence” finding in Jannik Sinner’s anti-doping case.

WADA is seeking a “period of ineligibility of one or two years,” in which the world No. 1 tennis player and two-time Grand Slam champion would be barred from competing in the sport at all levels. Sinner won the U.S. Open in New York just three weeks ago.

Sinner, who is currently playing at the China Open in Beijing, said he was “surprised” by WADA’s decision.

“Obviously I’m very disappointed and also surprised of this appeal, to be honest, because we had three hearings. All three hearings came out very positively for me,” he told reporters after beating Roman Safiullin to reach the last eight in Beijing.

“We always talk about the same thing. Maybe they just want to make sure that everything is in the right position.”

In a further statement, a “disappointed” Sinner added that there had been “three separate hearings in each case confirming my innocence” in the case.

“Several months of interviews and investigations culminated in three senior judges scrutinising every detail through a formal hearing,” the statement continued.

“They issued an in-depth judgement explaining why they determined me not at fault, with clear evidence provided and my cooperation throughout.

“On the back of such a robust process both the ITIA and the Italian anti-doping authority accepted it and waived their rights to appeal.”

Sinner added that the need for a “thorough investigation” was understandable and that he would “cooperate fully” in the investigation, but questioned why the process needed to be reopened.

Sinner tested positive for clostebol, a banned anabolic steroid, on two occasions: March 10, in-competition at the BNP Paribas Open held in Indian Wells, Calif, and March 18, out of competition.

An independent tribunal convened by the ITIA and conducted by Sports Resolutions ruled that Sinner bore “no fault or negligence” for those positive tests in a hearing on August 15, but still found Sinner to have committed two anti-doping violations, for which he was stripped of his ranking points, prize money, and results from that event.

It accepted the Italian world No.1’s explanation that Sinner’s physiotherapist, Umberto Ferrara, had brought an over-the-counter healing spray containing clostebol to Indian Wells. His trainer, physiotherapist, Giacomo Naldi, cut his hand, and then used the spray on that cut. Naldi then conducted massages on Sinner, which led to transdermal contamination with the clostebol from the healing spray.

Sinner parted company with Naldi and Ferrara on the eve of the U.S. Open.

WADA is now challenging the decision that Sinner was not at fault for his violation. In a statement released today Saturday September 28, it said: “The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) confirms that on Thursday 26 September, it lodged an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in the case of Italian tennis player, Jannik Sinner, who was found by an independent tribunal of the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) to bear no fault or negligence having twice tested positive for clostebol, a prohibited substance, in March 2024.

“It is WADA’s view that the finding of “no fault or negligence” was not correct under the applicable rules. WADA is seeking a period of ineligibility of between one and two years. WADA is not seeking a disqualification of any results, save that which has already been imposed by the tribunal of first instance.”

In response, the ITIA issued its own statement.

“The International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) acknowledges the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) decision to appeal the ruling of No Fault or Negligence in the case of Italian tennis player Jannik Sinner, issued by an independent tribunal appointed by Sport Resolutions on 19 August 2024. Under the terms of the World Anti-Doping Code, WADA has the final right to appeal all such decisions,” an ITIA spokesperson said.

“Having reached an agreed set of facts following a thorough investigative process, the case was referred to a tribunal entirely independent of the ITIA to determine level of fault and therefore sanction because of the unique set of circumstances, and lack of comparable precedent.

“The process was run according to World Anti-Doping Code guidelines; however, the ITIA acknowledges and respects WADA’s right to appeal the independent tribunal’s decision in the Court of Arbitration for Sport.”

Jannik Sinner won the U.S. Open in the immediate aftermath of the ITIA ruling on his anti-doping case. (Al Bello / Getty Images)

In the ITIA’s full decision, Professor David Cowan said that “even if the administration had been intentional, the minute amounts likely to have been administered would not have had […] any relevant doping, or performance enhancing, effect upon the player.”

A positive test for clostebol carries a mandatory provisional suspension from tennis, but two further independent tribunals upheld Sinner’s appeals against those suspensions, which were active between April 4 and April 5 and April 17 and April 20. The success of those appeals meant that the two positive tests, and the attached suspensions, were not made public until the conclusion of the ITIA’s investigation into Sinner’s case. This drew allegations of double standards from some of Sinner’s tennis peers, but is in line with ITIA protocol.

In a statement released at the conclusion of the investigation, Sinner said: “I will now put this very challenging and hugely unfortunate period behind me.” The best men’s tennis player in the world will have to resume it now.

GO DEEPER

What players’ reaction to Sinner’s doping case says about their trust in their sport

‘The news that Sinner will have been fearing’

Analysis from Charlie Eccleshare, tennis writer

Sinner emerged from months of uncertainty to win the U.S. Open three weeks ago. Now he has been put back under investigation, and the renewed scrutiny of the initial ITIA ruling that will come with it.

It wasn’t as though the world No. 1 necessarily appeared liberated in New York — his post-match press conference after the final was as much subdued as it was celebratory — but there was an air of Sinner having temporarily closed a chapter behind him.

The prospect of a WADA appeal was always there however, and Saturday morning brought the news that Sinner will have been fearing. He was able to compartmentalize pretty well during the five months from being told of the positive test to it becoming public in August. He even won the Cincinnati Open two days before the full decision in his case was released.

But in his post-final press conference in New York, he acknowledged that his demeanor and personality had changed during the investigation.

“Obviously, it was very difficult to enjoy certain moments,” he said.

“Even the way I behaved or how I entered the court in some tournaments was no longer the same as before.”

Jannik Sinner answered numerous questions about his case at his pre-tournament press conference and throughout the U.S. Open. (Jamie Squire / Getty Images)

This decision from WADA, and the attached seeking of a ban of up to two years, will be another big challenge of his mentality.

When the independent tribunal convened by the ITIA ruled that Sinner bore “no fault or negligence” — the key term that WADA is challenging — numerous players, some of them high-profile, expressed a view that the swiftness of his case pointed to double standards in the sport.

In the higher echelons of tennis there will surely be dismay at the world’s best male player facing a doping investigation, as WADA’s appeal will now be referred to CAS.

(Top photo: Kena Betancur / AFP via Getty Images)