Halep hit by second doping charge

Simona Halep was slammed with a second charge of doping on Friday with a first case against the two-time grand Slam winner still pending.

The 31-year-old Romanian who holds Wimbledon and French Open trophies, was charged for the catch-all “irregularities in her athlete biological passport”.

Halep has been out of action and awaiting her day in tennis court since October after testing positive for a banned substance at the US Open.

Halep has been pleading her innocence from the start, with some major figures in the game coming to her defence.

She said on Instagram that she felt “helpless facing such harassment” as she denies the charges.

The athlete biological passport is a statistics-based control which checks biological data over time to try and spot doping irregularities.

Halep was suspended – and awaits her doping court hearing – for more than half a year; she tested positive roxadustat, an anti-anaemia drug which stimulates the production of red blood cells..

“I have lived the worst nightmare I have ever gone through in my life,” she said.

“Not only has my name been soiled in the worst possible way, but I am facing a constant determination from the ITIA, for a reason that I cannot understand, to prove my guilt while I haven’t ever thought of taking an illicit substance.”

Halep is currently scheduled to present her side of the oridingla doping case later this month.

Halep’s cse is the biggest since tennis icon Maria Sharapova tested positive in 2016 for a heart medication and served a ban.