AFTER failing a drug test, Irish boxer Michael O’Reilly has been handed a ban that will keep him out of the sport until 2020.
The middleweight’s adverse finding was revealed in dramatic circumstances during the tournament draw on the eve of the boxing event at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. He tested positive for banned substance methandienone, a prohibited substance, and has been handed a four-year ban. He has been on a provisional suspension since then. His ban will be date from the drug test and so will run until July 10 2020.
O’Reilly said he “unintentionally took a supplement that may have contained a prohibited substance” given to him by someone unrelated to the Irish boxing team or association.
The Portaloise middleweight was one of Ireland’s medal hopes at Rio 2016. He was seeded and would have had a good draw if he’d been permitted to competed. He was already a European Games gold medallist and a 2015 World championships bronze medallist.
O’Reilly is 24 years old and is the first Irish boxer to be handed a four-year ban for a doping offence.
