The Kerry footballer at the centre of the GAA anti-doping violation case, was initially informed by Sport Ireland that he was banned for four years.
Eamonn Fitzmaurice, the Kerry manager, said that Brendan O’Sullivan, who served 21 weeks for providing a positive sample after last year’s league final, was in “shock” at first.
O’Sullivan tested positive for Methylhexaneamine, a banned substance, and was informed during a phone call on May 12 last year that he was suspended for four years, according to Fitzmaurice.
It was subsequently accepted that the Valentia player unwittingly consumed the product in a contaminated batch of caffeine tablets bought from a health store.
O’Sullivan trained with the Kerry squad this week and is available for selection when they put their Munster title on the line against Clare in Ennis on Sunday.
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“There was the initial shock: four years you’re banned, from everything, from every sport that exists,” Fitzmaurice said. “Then there was relief at straight away identifying what happened, getting the contaminated product over to the authorities, and coming back training with us. He thought that was it.
“Then, the next thing, 21st of December last, another phone call — you’re banned for seven months.”
Subsequent appeals reduced the ban to 21 weeks, which O’Sullivan has now served. Fitzmaurice said that he has no issue with drug testing in the GAA but claimed the process has dragged on far too long in this case.
“It’s grand being held to the World Anti-Doping Authority’s [Wada] standards but look at how long the process takes. That to me is not very professional,” Fitzmaurice said. “It just isn’t, I don’t care.”
Fitzmaurice, who guided Kerry to the 2014 All-Ireland title, acknowledged that Kerry didn’t provide enough anti-doping education to players. “Yeah, that was a harsh lesson for all of us,” he said.
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He also confirmed that O’Sullivan bought the caffeine tablets as he did not like the taste of the regular caffeine gels that were provided to players.
“He’s never said this to me but I would imagine, because of the kind of person he is, that he was saying to himself, ‘This is my first time on the Kerry panel, I’m not going to be a prima donna and say I don’t like the taste of the gel’,” Fitzmaurice said. “So he went off and got something else.
“He rang me at half ten on the day he was informed of the ban. By the time we were finished the phone call I knew where the problem was straight away.”
O’Sullivan revealed that he’d consumed eight different supplements in the run up to last year’s league final.
“If they were to eat as much fish, chicken, meat to get what they need in, they’d be eating a huge amount of food to get the requisite calories,” Fitzmaurice said. “I know that’s what Wada advise but in the real world, particularly for people that are working, it’s very hard to eat that amount of food.”