Throughout its history, tennis has seen powerful swings of fortune, few as firmly shaking the game as doping bans. Tennis is a game of endurance and skill, and with plenty of mental toughness, players still sometimes cut corners-sometimes without realizing it, sometimes on purpose.
The International Tennis Federation (ITF) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) have worked hand in hand to keep the sport free and fair, though history has shown that even some top tier have felt the reactions of banned substances.
Fated differently, but all these men have left their imprint on tennis; separately, examples of doping scandals at their most touching moments. Which are these men and how did their various bans develop? Let’s take a look at the top five men’s tennis players who were caught doping and subsequently punished.
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Unlike others on the list, although Viktor Troicki never tested positive for a banned substance, the governing body still banned him for 18 months for refusing to provide a blood sample. Troicki provided only a urine sample in the doping control conducted at the 2013 Monte Carlo Masters, declining to provide a blood sample saying he was ill and suffered from a lifelong phobia of needles.
Because ITF did not see any grounds for Troicki’s refusal, it handed him an 18-month suspension, which was later cut down to 12 months upon appeal to CAS. Troicki came back in 2014 with a ranking of 847, having to restart his career on the Challenger circuit, he found a way back to win the title 2015 Sydney International and aid Serbia in winning the Continental Cup in 2010.
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In March 2009, officials found cocaine in the Frenchman’s system and imposed a two-year ban on him. The doping fiasco of Richard Gasquet was bizarre, as well as controversial. In March 2009, the Frenchman tested positive for cocaine and was hit with a two-year ban. However, Gasquet denied ever intentionally taking the drug, instead claiming he had ingested it through kissing a woman at a Miami nightclub.
Initially, the ITF suspended him for one year, but an independent tribunal ruled in his favor, reducing his ban to just six weeks. The CAS later upheld this decision, citing the minuscule traces of cocaine found in his sample.
Former world No. 10 and 2007 Wimbledon semifinalist Gasquet returned just in time for the 2010 Australian Open. He has won 16 ATP singles titles, briefly reached No. 7 in the world, and helped France win the Davis Cup in 2017.
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A Grand Slam champion with an otherwise clean record, Marin Cilic found himself embroiled in controversy in 2013 when he tested positive for nikethamide, a stimulant that increases oxygen intake. Cilic, the Croatian, alleged his innocence, denying knowledge of ever taking the drug and maintaining that he inadvertently consumed the substance via glucose tablets bought from France.
Initially, they banned Cilic for nine months. Cilic appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), which reduced the suspension to four months. His ranking and revenue for the 2013 French Open, Wimbledon, and BMW Open are gone, but his comeback was robust.
In a year, Cilic won the US Open in 2014, his first and only Grand Slam title. Cilic won 21 singles titles throughout his career, reached a maximum ranking of No. 3, and led Croatia to victory in the 2018 Davis Cup.
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Officials busted Australian Open 2025 Champion Jannik Sinner for clostebol, an anabolic steroid, in one of the most astonishing doping cases in recent memory. The 2024 scandal sent shockwaves through the tennis world, especially since Sinner had grown up and built his reputation on hard work and integrity.
According to the ITIA, his physiotherapist had unknowingly been spreading the substance across a cut on Sinner’s finger, which later could have entered the bloodstream through subsequent massages. WADA, which initially cleared him, would later appeal, insisting that “no fault or negligence” was an incorrect ruling.
Facing increasing scrutiny, Sinner accepted a three-month suspension, missing crucial tournaments but returning just in time for the French Open for this year’s French Open (2025). Sinner has won the 2024, and Australian Open 2025 to go with the 2024 US Open.
Few names in tennis history shine as brightly as Andre Agassi’s, but the American legend’s legacy includes a dark chapter. 1997, when his life was filled with many changes, Agassi tested positive for methamphetamine. At that time, he maintained his innocence, saying that it was an incident involving some spiking of his drink, and the ATP termed it as such, giving him only a three-month suspension.
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However, in 2009, Agassi turned the tennis world upside down by announcing in his autobiography that he had knowingly taken crystal meth and had falsified the ‘spiked drink’ story.
The revelation sparked a massive debacle on retroactive punishments, as the offense predated WADA’s formation in 1999 and the ITF’s takeover of the ATP’s anti-doping program in 2007, no such further action was taken. Agassi has won a tally of eight Grand Slam titles along with an Olympic gold medal (in Atlanta, 1996) and a career Grand Slam.
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