NEW DELHI: A leading leg-spinner and a wicketkeeper-batsman, both part of the current Indian cricket set-up and centrally-contracted with the BCCI, have been added by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) to its revised list of Registered Testing Pool (RTP), which was recently updated by the country’s anti-doping watchdog.
With the addition of two new names, the list of male Indian cricketers registered with NADA for dope testing of their samples stands at three.
While the leg-spinner is an integral part of India’s white-ball cricket team and will be seen in the upcoming T20 International and ODI series, the wicketkeeper-batsman represents the country in the Test team as well, apart from the limited-overs cricket.
These cricketers are not part of the International Cricket Council‘s (ICC) RTP and will be subject to testing by the NADA.
In September 2019, NADA had created the RTP of cricketers for both men and women. The list included Cheteshwar Pujara, Lokesh Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja (men) and Smriti Mandhana and Deepti Sharma. These names were the first set of cricketers who had shared their ‘whereabout’ details with the NADA DCOs for remaining available to give their urine samples for testing.
Now, out of these three men cricketers, one has moved to the ICC’s RTP and is no longer available for testing with the NADA. The request for having the said cricketer on the ICC’s RTP came from the sport’s governing body and the NADA obliged.
During the last edition of IPL played in UAE, only KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja were on NADA’s RTP.
Now, one out of the two cricketers is no longer on NADA’s testing pool after the recent revision of the list.