Racing
League
Rugby
Cricket
Golf
Motorsport
Combat Sports
Football
Netball
Basketball
Other Sports
Sport Nation
SELECT 👉 Go Media in-stadium feed
AFL CEO Andrew Dillon speaks exclusively on illicit drugs policy, target testing of players
Sam Edmund • March 13th, 2025 11:49 am
Andrew Dillon vehemently denies the AFL reveals the identity of players who test positive for illicit drugs in creating a target list for performance enhancing substances.
In an interview with SEN.com.au, the AFL boss insisted player confidentiality around the illicit drugs code had not been breached.
Revelations the league had last season given Sport Integrity Australia (SIA) the names of 51 players for target testing had seen the AFL Players Association become increasingly suspicious over the method used to do so.
But Dillon told SEN.com.au: “What is absolutely clear is that the results from hair testing are kept absolutely confidential.
“There’s no provision of that data or information to anyone outside the AFL apart from club doctors.”
The friction between the AFL and the AFLPA comes at a delicate time, with the two bodies already at loggerheads over the league’s determination to toughen the contentious illicit drugs policy.
Dillon moved to reject reports the AFL had backed away from wanting a $5000 fine for a first strike under a new code.
Under the existing policy, there is a suspended $5000 fine for a first offence.
“No, that’s incorrect. We don’t talk about negotiations, but we put a position to the AFLPA and like every position, it’s a negotiation,” he said.
“But we haven’t walked anything back. What we have said to them is: ‘We want to refine and strengthen the policy, here is our way of strengthening it, what are the alternatives?’
“We said we’re open to alternatives, but that’s not necessarily walking anything back.”
After a week of building tension between the league and player union, the AFL formally replied to the play union’s letter of enquiry in “full detail” on Tuesday, detailing how it forms its performance-enhancing target-testing lists.
“The list of names that gets provided is based on intelligence our integrity unit gathers from heaps of different sources. Federal police, state police, other intelligence we get from Sport Integrity Australia, social media and a whole host of other things that go into it,” Dillon said.
“For transparency, those (hair) testing results might be part of the intelligence you use when compiling the list, but by no means is it every single player on that list has got a positive hair test in the same way that not every play on that list has been part of the intelligence gathered by any other means.
“There are many data points. We give them the names, but not the data points for the names and they don’t ask for that.
“They have their own list because ultimately they’re the ones who decide who gets tested.”
An Auditor-General report into SIA’s management of the National Anti-Doping Scheme revealed the agency collected samples from 50 of the AFL’s 51 names, plus another 235 players not on the list.
The report stated the AFL “did not include information on the reason for targeting”.
