Francis short on facts, game short on testing

The OLD joke goes that when Bob Hope sliced his first tee-shot way off the fairway, Lee Trevino turned to him and said: "are you taking marijuana?"

"No, absolutely not," protested the comedian, to which the golfer responded: "Well, maybe you should be."

One imagine the wags in the pubs are having a good old laugh at the expense of Neil Francis and Irish rugby just now, given that Irish performances didn't appear to be terribly well-enhanced by any outside forces.

Even his one-time team-mate Dennis McBride, whose international career ran alongside Francis's, was moved to describe the comments as "quite laughable and ludicrous".

Of course, it was always likely that Irish rugby would collectively dismiss Francis' claims with a derisory "bah, humbug". But clearly something is amiss, even if it would merely require two Irish internationals in the last decade to have taken banned, performance-enhancing substances for Francis's allegations to be factually correct. Nor, one presumes, would Francis have made these claims lightly. Even though he runs the risk of being ridiculed or castigated, Francis has been there and bought the T-shirt, and still knows many players on a social and private basis. There's no doubt he would be more privy to information regarding banned substances in the sport than most people.

Unfortunately, the vagueness of the claims leaves them open to all sorts of interpretations. The former Irish lock could be stating that anything from two to 200 Irish players have taken performance-enhancing drugs, and the slant of the article hinted at the latter.

Perhaps the article was being deliberately vague, so as not to leave the Sunday Tribune and Francis (who recently lost a case to George Hook) open to libel actions. The flip side of that coin, though, is that pretty much everybody who ever shared an Irish dressing-room with Francis has been tarred with the same brush.

Hence, the anger, indignation and risible responses of former Irish team-mates is quite genuine. They feel hurt by his claims. Francis is making no comment, but I daresay he regrets the slant put on the article and the fall-out that has followed, even if he would stand over the basic tenor of his allegations.

Still they raised more questions than they answered. Did he ever witness the taking of the performance enhancing drugs first hand, or did he hear of it? How commonplace was/is the abuse? What substances were taken? How did they become available? In short, is there any evidence at all?

The Sunday Tribune's editor, Matt Cooper, stated yesterday that Francis's claims were "based on conversations with other players during his career", adding, "Neil Francis never said the abuse of drugs in rugby was widespread or rife". This suggests that only a few players have told Francis they have taken illegal substances. Nevertheless, the ball is still in Neil Francis's and the Sunday Tribune's court.

All the players this writer has spoken to over the years uniformly maintain a strikingly similar stance. I believe one Irish international player, a good friend, implicitly when he says "I've never had anything offered to me and I've never known or heard of any player who took anything. I don't know where Franno is getting the idea from".

Of course, Francis would contend, much like Mandy RiceDavies, that "he would say that, wouldn't he?" And, he might add, especially to a journalist.

Nor can the IRFU unequivocally back up its belief that Irish rugby is clean. Mind you, by the same token, it's very easy for Sports Minister Dr Jim McDaid to jump on the bandwagon and claim: "It would be naive to think that Irish sport is totally free from drug abuse."

This is because there is really no substantive evidence either way. The IRFU cannot support its stance by producing records of drug tests throughout Irish rugby. "We have tested X number of players and the results are . . . ." This is because there are limited facilities available for drug testing in Ireland, a deficiency that has failed to be addressed by successive governments and sports ministers.

The only time Irish players are ever tested is after internationals and, damningly, only after interprovincial games in Belfast, which are under the auspices of the British Sports Council. There are no tests after AIL games, or European Cup games - or for that matter domestic soccer matches or GAA matches.

Though the authorities may not like admitting it, drug testing in Irish sport is anything but rigorous. Nor are the English well placed to counter Francis's claim that the Allied Dunbar League is fast becoming the Anabolic-Dunbar League given the absence of testing in that competition.

Ironically, for all the suspicions about Southern Hemisphere rugby, the testing regime there is actually far more rigorous, although John Mitchell heightened suspicions when commenting on the staggering physical development of players in the Southern Hemisphere during England's tour last summer.

Times have changed drastically since 1998, too. For starters, there has been the advent of professionalism. There has been a commensurate increase in physique and fitness with players now having daily work-outs in gyms, the habitat of body-builders and, in some, sweaty-palmed dealers.

It was always likely that illegal, performance-enhancing drugs would become more readily available in the world of rugby.

However, to all intents and purposes, whether Irish players have been availing of this, and to what extent, remains as unclear this week as it was last week or any other week.