Allardyce warns of recreational drug misuse

Dubai: West Ham United manager Sam Allardyce has played down talk of performance-enhancing drugs being a problem in English football, but admitted the use of recreational drugs is a growing concern.

His comments came a week after the Australian Crime Commission published findings from a year-long investigation, describing the use of banned substances in professional Australian sport as widespread.

The subject of drugs in sport has been rife ever since American cyclist Lance Armstrong was handed a life ban and stripped of his seven Tour de France wins for doping last year.

Speaking at an ‘Audience With Sam Allardyce’ at The West Beach Bistro and Sports Lounge at The Movenpick Hotel at Dubai’s Jumeirah Beach Residences on Wednesday night, Allardyce said: “In terms of players doping to enhance performance? No, it doesn’t happen.

“Football players don’t need to be doped to enhance performance in the same way as cycling, perhaps swimming or athletics.”

But the former Bolton and Newcastle manager added: “I think there’s a big problem in today’s society that drugs play a massive part in our country [England] now. But that’s social drug-taking, not performance enhancing.

“There’s little or no players who have been actually proven. Some of the Dutch players have been caught. But generally it’s not linked to enhancing the performance of a footballer. What is a problem, particularly with young players, like any young person today, is social drug misuse.”

Allardyce went on to discuss former England midfielder Paul Gascoigne’s recent stay in intensive care in America following an allergic reaction to a detox in rehab. Of ‘Gazza’, one of football’s starkest examples of a player having a career curtailed by drug and alcohol abuse, he said: “There’s only one person who can help Paul Gascoigne and that’s Paul Gascoigne.

“He can only recover when he tells everybody, ‘Please help me, I don’t want to do this anymore, I don’t want to die’. And if he doesn’t do that, it doesn’t matter how hard people try, he will revert back to being an alcoholic.”

Allardyce added that prevention was better than cure and praised the work of academy directors who were now specially trained to identify and react to the signs of youngsters susceptible to addiction. He also said that Gazza’s current ill health was not the responsibility of the English Football Association.

In a reference to current England stars such as Wayne Rooney and Steven Gerrard, who have raised cash for Gascoigne’s treatment, he added: “Everybody who knows Gazza has pumped in a considerable amount of money. This is a massive expenditure in recovery, particularly with America and what they charge. A lot of players who love Gazza have given their honest money and if that doesn’t make Gazza better, nothing will.”