In an editorial in Le Monde, former Roland Garros champion and French Davis and Fed Cup captain Yannick Noah lashes out at Spanish sporting culture, alleging that the reason for the rise of Spain's success may have to do with taking a “magic potion.”
"When I still milled around on the courts with my racket, we weren't ridiculous, far from it, against our Spanish friends," Noah wrote. "Same on the soccer fields, the basketballs halls or on the roads of the Tour de France. Today they are running faster than us, are much more stronger and only leave us the bread crumbs. Compared to us, it's simple, we look like dwarves. Did we miss something?
"How can a nation dominate virtually overnight sport in such a way? Did they discover some avant-garde techniques or training facilities that nobody before them had imagined? I have searched and didn't find any documented evidence of such innovations … Today if you don't have the magic potion, it's hard to win … In the last years they may have abused a bit of it, considering the avalanche of positive tests … You know what they talk about at the sports bars: those who win are those who can slip out of the net, those who are quicker than the controllers and use the non-detectable drugs ... In Spain, the Fuentes case, the biggest scandal in the history of the sport [where a Spanish doctor was arrested for allegedly aiding famous cyclists and others with blood doping], they did ‘nothing.’ Maybe because, over there, sport is so important its heroes are more protected … Of course you have to apply 'innocent until proven guilty,' but nobody is fooled. The best attitude would be to accept doping. Let everyone have his magic potion."
Spanish tennis player David Ferrer reacted, telling DPA: "Your son [Joakim Noah of the Chicago Bulls] plays in the NBA, where there are no doping controls. This is not the best person to talk, I think it’s total ignorance. For a person who has played tennis and knows how the sport works to say that is outrageous with reason or thinking."
On Twitter, another Spanish player, Feliciano Lopez said that he was disappointed that one of his one-time heroes would say such stupid things.
Former Wimbledon champion Manolo Santana added: "It seems out of place. Spain is now the leading power of sport and statements like that are not good for him and not for sport in general ... When people want fame, the only way to have it's messing with a person or an entity as large as Spain in sport. In basketball, soccer, tennis, Formula One, athletics—in all sports Spain is at the forefront."