FIFA keep reduced drug bans for players

New doping controls could be intoduced by FIFA after the world governing body reached a new agreement with an anti-doping agency.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter says the new arrangement with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) will not be used in every case.

WADA was created by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and sees the sports unify drug policy.

The IOC have wanted stricter doping controls to apply in football and the adoption of new doping policy could see more players test positive for banned substances.

Doping use in athletics, swimming, cycling and other sports with close IOC links is at a very advanced level.

It is rare for athletes to be caught out failing a dope test to produce a positive nandrolone test but that steroid has produced a crop of nearly twenty doping cases this year with Italy suffering a spate of dope test failures.

Brescia's Spanish midfielder Josep Guardiola has been provisionally suspended after two positive tests for nandrolone in the last two weeks with SS Lazio's Dutch defender Jaap Stam also facing a four month ban after failing a dope test.

But Blatter says the current problems in Europe are not the reason for the WADA accord:

"Our agreement has nothing to do with the last cases of positive doping with Nandrolone. The IOC has been inviting us for over a year to sign an accord. We are ready to sign an agreement but one which gives FIFA its independence," he said.

FIFA still want footballers caught using banned substances to suffer less stringent bans than those imposed in other sports.