“I can’t call it doping” – American legend, Andy Roddick has time and again showcased his support for Iga Swiatek on the doping saga. He was also seen raising his voice against punishing players in cases where performance couldn’t have been enhanced. Almost a week ago, he said what happened with Swiatek is quite “unfortunate,” and then he raised a few question marks by asking, “Are we going to cling to a billionth of a gram of something that hasn’t enhanced performance? What are we trying to solve with the ITIA and then with the WADA?” Recently, Roddick was yet again spotted calling for better rules and regulations for the ITIA.

Andy Roddick recently made an appearance on the Christian’s Court YouTube Channel. During the conversation, he time and again highlighted that the doping scandal shouldn’t overshadow Iga Swiatek’s legacy as a 5-time Grand Slam champion. He said, “I think we’ve proven over and over that we are not really great at nuance, at scale. We are all guilty of it. The beauty of information being available all the time is that we can consume it all the time. The problem with it is that we consume it all the time. We deal in headlines largely.” 

After that, the American even highlighted certain things that he felt that there needs to be improved. What are those things, though? He said, “It’s unfortunate I think it’s just really proving that we need consistency with messaging. We need clear outlines of rules! You go on the ITIA site and they say 40 or 30%, I forgot the number but somewhere around there of positives are from contaminated supplements that you and I probably take. But we’re not getting tested on a billionth of a gram of something.“

He spoke about how unfortunate it’s to see these types of storylines dominating the offseason and he hoped that things would get in a better place with testing protocols, clear messaging, and a little bit more transparency so that players aren’t kind of forced to keep something secret until things have been tested. Andy Roddick feels these things put the players in a “pretty weird spot.“

Interestingly, amid all these happenings, WADA recently came up with some new rules. On December 5, WADA’s Executive Committee met, and as reported by Ubitennis, a series of changes were approved to be introduced in the anti-doping regulations, coming into effect on January 2027. What are those proposed changes? These changes promise to better manage so-called, ‘involuntary doping cases,’ where athletes are found to have ingested some banned substance unintentionally.

The first change is the changing of the concept of “contaminated product” to “contaminated source” with the definition of the latter being very different from the former. The second change which will be introduced in 2027, involves the potential establishment of minimum concentration levels below which the presence of a non-threshold substance wouldn’t constitute a positive result.

Interestingly, both these changes are new positives for the sport because they’ll make the process much simpler and transparent. Several experts have come out to express their opinions on these new rules. What did Andy Roddick say on this? Well, he hasn’t yet put up a comment on this. It’ll be interesting to see what he says on this, but recently he was seen giving some advice to Iga Swiatek. What did he say?

Andy Roddick advises Iga Swiatek to reach out to Jannik Sinner

We all know Jannik Sinner was cleared by the ITIA in his doping case and didn’t get suspended but he did face quite a few backlashes from the fans and some of the players. Now, Iga Swiatek is facing a similar situation where she has been on the receiving end of all the criticisms. So, according to Andy Roddick, Swiatek should reach out to Jannik Sinner to figure out how to best handle the public criticism. 

With the 2025 season knocking at the door, Roddick perhaps wants Swiatek to figure out something pretty quickly that will help her concentrate fully on the game. We saw how Jannik Sinner did that successfully at the 2024 US Open. So, Roddick stated, “Jannik was able to separate what is going on outside of the court versus the job I have to do on a day-to-day basis. If I am Iga I am probably calling him and saying are there any hacks that have helped you deal with it the way you have?“

He even gave her a few advice on how to handle these types of situations when she makes her return to the Tour. During the same video clip on Christian’s Court YouTube Channel, Roddick said, “If I’m in her corner I would just say don’t have a moment where you are exhausted by it, just be patient with the process and do what you have to do. The more emotion you show, the more likely it is to be a story over and over again.” Share your thoughts on Andy Roddick’s advice to Iga Swiatek on the handling these type of situation amidst the doping saga.