Ebook456 pages7 hours
The Straight Dope Updated Edition: The Inside Story of Sport's Biggest Drug Scandal
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
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About this ebook
The greatest drugs scandal in Australian sport goes well beyond who took what.
What happened at Essendon, what happened at Cronulla, is only part of the story. From the basement office of a suburban football club to the seedy corners of Peptide Alley to the polished corridors of Parliament House, The Straight Dope is an inside account of the politics, greed and personal feuds which fuelled an extraordinary saga. Clubs and coaches determined to win, a sports scientist who doesn't play by the rules, a generation of footballers injected with who knows what, sport administrators hell bent on control, an anti-doping authority out of its depth, an unpopular government that just wants it to end ... for three years until the final, crushing judgement handed down by an international tribunal, this was the biggest game in Australia.
What happened at Essendon, what happened at Cronulla, is only part of the story. From the basement office of a suburban football club to the seedy corners of Peptide Alley to the polished corridors of Parliament House, The Straight Dope is an inside account of the politics, greed and personal feuds which fuelled an extraordinary saga. Clubs and coaches determined to win, a sports scientist who doesn't play by the rules, a generation of footballers injected with who knows what, sport administrators hell bent on control, an anti-doping authority out of its depth, an unpopular government that just wants it to end ... for three years until the final, crushing judgement handed down by an international tribunal, this was the biggest game in Australia.
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Reviews for The Straight Dope Updated Edition
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
7 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5In this book, Australian journalist Chip Le Grand has tackled the peptides saga that dominated sports discussion in his country for more than three years. Essendon (AFL) and Cronulla-Sutherland (NRL) were the professional football teams caught up in this mess. Le Grand's coverage focuses mainly on Essendon's activities.As has been the case with other coverage of this drawn-out series of events, there is an incredible amount of finger-pointing and very little acceptance of responsibility. As a result, there is a significant number of damaged people and relationships.To an outsider, it seems pretty obvious what the problem was, and to watch so many people scramble around raising virtually irrelevant points of law to try and prove something (what?) seems to be an extraordinary waste of time and money. It's also incredible to read, in the last chapter, that the main protagonist in the whole affair was very close to working for another AFL club! Does no one in the League do any due diligence about who they hire as an employee or consultant?Unfortunately, this book was published before WADA decided there *was* a case to answer by Essendon, and the players involved were banned from playing for the 2016 season.While the research behind this book is clearly excellent, I found some of the telling confusing chronologically, and there seemed, to this reader, to be an anti-AFL and anti-ASADA feel to the story.I am still at a loss as to why Dr Reid was ever implicated in any wrongdoing at the Club.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The author does a good job of fitting this giant jigsaw puzzle together in a readable form. Besides a clumsily long list of central figures, there is an endless list of secondary actors, dates, locations, leagues, corporations and agencies to try to wrap your head around. While my lack of knowledge regarding Australian news events, government authorities and rugby sporting scene complicated matters, the positive possibilities of finding drama in events that Australians have already been reading about for two years was unmet. In general, this isn't a page turner. That isn't a deal-breaker though. This is solid, in-depth investigative journalism.
Book preview
The Straight Dope Updated Edition - Chip Le Grand
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