Nadal to Meet With Prime Minster to Discuss Dispute With France

Written by: Staff on 14th February 2012

Nadal to Meet With Prime Minster to Discuss Dispute With France |

Rafael Nadal will meet with Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy today and part of their discussion could be about his feelings that there is a general campaign in France to discredit Spanish athletes by implying their success is due to doping.

DPA is reporting that Nadal will have a private meeting with Rajoy after the 2011 title winning Spanish Davis Cup team meets with him and King Juan Carlos

Nadal is upset about a recent episode of the French TV station Canal Plus’ show “The Puppeteers” that put together a skit of Nadal where it appears he is drinking something that gives him an abundance of energy and implies that he is doping.

“I don’t think it’s just one media, it’s a general campaign by the neighboring country,” Nadal said last weekend. “It’s sad to see a campaign like that against something that has cost so much to achieve. There’s no question of pills or syringes or anything like that I can assure you.”

The Spanish Tennis Federation and the Spanish Olympic Committee are threatening to sue the station, and the government in Madrid has contacted their counterparts in Paris to complain.

As Nadal’s uncle and coach Toni has said, if this were an isolated incident, it might have passed without a strong reaction, but the TV skit comes just a few moths after France ‘s Yannick Noah – the former Roland Garros champion — wrote an editorial where he alleged that Spanish athletes might be doping. The Spanish Tennis community was outraged and struck back with some editorials of their own, including one penned by former Davis Cup captain Emilio Sanchez-Vicario.

Topics: France, Rafael Nadal