Former Springbok Ashley Johnson who has been playing for English Premiership Wasps RFC for the past six seasons, has copped a six-month ban after testing positive for a banned substance.
The test was done back in February this year and the results were confirmed by the National Anti-Doping Panel (NADP), the United Kingdom's independent tribunal responsible for adjudicating anti-doping disputes in sport.
At the NADP hearing, Johnson said that be he mistakenly taken his wife’s tablets.
The former Paarl Gymnasium schoolboy Johnson acquitted himself well at the hearing and it was felt that he made a genuine mistake. As a result, the sentence was backdated to February and he'll be free to play in August.
In the interim, he's free to train with his club Wasps.
In a statement released to the media, Wasps Director of rugby David Young said: “We fully support the measures in place to keep rugby doping-free, and are grateful for the professionalism shown by everyone involved in this case.
“Ashley has been at Wasps since 2012 and in that time successfully completed countless anti-doping tests.
“He is an extremely honourable person who has made a one-off accidental error for which he has held his hands up, apologised and accepted the consequences.
“This situation has highlighted just how easily a player can make a mistake of this kind.
"We have therefore strongly reinforced to all our squad that they must always be on their guard and fully aware of exactly what they consume.
“The last few months have been doubly difficult for us all because a process had to be followed and that prevented Ashley or anyone at Wasps from providing updates."
Johnson was a highly relieved man after the hearing.
“I was horrified when I got the test results and once we tracked back and worked out I had inadvertently taken the wrong tablet,” Johnson said in a statement.
“I completely accept that I am responsible for everything in my body. Drug use is not something I would ever condone, and from now on I will be extra vigilant at all times."
As it turned out, the 32-year-old Johnson had mistakenly ingested one of his wife’s fat-stripping tablets, named ‘The Secret’, instead of his supplement tablet ‘Nutrilean’.