ICC conducts dope tests

The International Cricket Council (ICC) have tested selected players in World Cup warm-up games toensure a drugs-free tournament, a senior official said on Thursday.
"Iunderstand that there were some target testing done at practice matches," DaveRichardson, ICC general manager, cricket, told reporters. He did not give anynames."Whether there will be some more testing in tomorrow's games I'm notsure," he said, referring to the final warm-up matches.
Doping came to the forebefore the World Cup, opening in the West Indies on March 11, due to thecontroversy around Pakistan fast bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif whotested positive last year.The ICC then announced specific players would betested apart from the routine random testing during matches.
The Pakistani duo were withdrawn from last year's Champions Trophy after testingpositive for the banned steroid nandrolone and suspended but a Pakistan appealstribunal cleared them of any wrongdoing.The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) hasappealed against that decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sports and itsdecision is pending.Shoaib and Asif pulled out of the World Cup due to injuriesamid media reports in Pakistan that the duo underwent private dope tests inLondon."It has become an issue unfortunately, but touch wood we should maintainthe record that no player has tested positive at an ICC event," said Richardson.Urine samples would be tested in Jamaica which has a good laboratory due to thepresence of world class athletes.