@Adam.
Not suggesting you were leading a hounding. Apologies if I gave that impression.
Yes, you are right. It is possible that what we've been reading in the press etc is complete rot. In a funny way I hope it is.
But don't confuse our open forum whereby we get to express our feelings/thoughts etc with canning the career of a pro cyclist. Really, we're not that influential !
I've been on this forum quite a while now and have seen a steady turn against Marco and others prepared to start a discussion on these subjects that are obviously touchy, passionate, emotive and polarising.
Part of the problem that exists is that the authorities in charge, mostly the UCI, are not being as transparent or as honest as they should be. Only this morning I read on Cycling News that AC now says that Pat McQuaid told him to keep schtum on the subject as it'll all be cleaned up, only it wasn't....fair enough, keep quite to the likes of us (general public, media etc) , but to his team(s) ? Now surely that doesn't make sense.
I am lead to understand that the tests done by properly accredited, scientifically validated labs, tend to filter out the odd contamination from a couple of drops of duff cough mixture or the like. Its usually the use of statistics and probability that determines this. Its not an exact science. If the labs put out the results in the raw, every rider in the peloton would be +ve for exactly the reasons you are suggesting.
You are right we shouldn't jump to conclusions too quickly or be prepared to burn the witch because she floats until the close approximation of truth is out. None of us are doing that though. I'll say it again, all is being said is "That looks dodgy. Have you heard about this ? This doesn't seem right" etc.
I think you're being a bit melodramatic about your example of yourself. Sorry, I'm not trying to bait you or wind you up, its my opinion. I'm not in your situation so I don't know if its justified or not either, so if I'm wrong, I'm wrong and that's it, I apologise un-reservedly. I would like to think that should that situation arise you would still progress get a pro contract etc without too much difficulty if it was merited. The general public however might not let go, but that's a fact of life, there's no accounting for stupidity.
All I want, honestly, is for an athlete who is caught to say, straight away, not after court cases, smearing, denial etc, "fair cop guv" and give up the facts of how it came to be, who helped him (its impossible to do on your own). Be a f-ing man, in simple terms.
For the purposes of fairplay too. My name is Matthew Cowen. I was in the Addiscombe for a couple of years before finding somewhere more sunny to live
(Marco can't change my username to Matthew, is it possible?)