Two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep is no longer working with coach Patrick Mouratoglou's academy while she awaits a ruling on her appeal of a four-year doping suspension and figures her tennis career will be over if the Court of Arbitration for Sport rules against her.
“Four years is going to be a lot for my age,” Halep, a 32-year-old from Romania who has been No. 1 in the WTA rankings, said in an interview with euronews posted online on Friday.
“It's catastrophic if it's going to be four years,” she said.
“And I don't know how I will handle it. Probably it's going to be (the) end of (my) career, yes.”
A three-day hearing with the Court of Arbitration for Sport is scheduled for February 7-9 in her appeal against the International Tennis Integrity Agency, which ruled that Halep “committed intentional anti-doping rule violations.”
Halep tested positive for the drug Roxadustat at the 2022 US Open and also was cited for irregularities in her biological passport. Roxadustat stimulates the body to produce more of the natural hormone erythropoietin, or EPO, which has long been a doping product favoured by cyclists and distance runners.
