ARU to ban Barba from Brisbane Tens
Ben Barba has banned from the National Rugby League after testing positive to cocaine four days after the Sharks' NRL win late in 2016.
The 27-year-old fullback recently signed a three-year deal with French giants, Toulon. Due to the drug ban only preventing him from playing in the NRL, Barba's move to Toulon means the player is eligible to make his debut for the French side at the inaugural Brisbane Global Tens.
However, with the new developments between ARU and NRL, it appears that Barba may have to wait a while before he straps on his boots again.
While the ARU isn't running the Tens event, every rugby event in Australia has to be sanctioned by the national body, and ARU CEO Bill Pulver said they would fall into line with the ban the NRL had put in place on the fullback.
According to rugby.com.au the Brisbane Tens organisers CEO Rachael Carroll had said earlier in the week that an invitation could be extended to Barba but Pulver shot down that possibility on Thursday.
"There is an agreement among all of the codes that if there are existing sanctions in place in one code and a player chooses to change to another code, the codes always relentlessly carry those sanctions across," Pulver said.
"I don't know the fine detail of Barba's sanction but clearly it will be something we'll be talking to the FFR in relation to the potential involvement of any player. If any player had a sanction in an alternate code during a period where they wanted to play in something like the [Brisbane] Tens, that would be an issue,"
Pulver said he had yet to speak to NRL CEO Todd Greenberg on Barba's situation, having just returned from a global rugby summit in San Francisco, but would be on board with whatever punishment their counterparts had settled on.
"Todd and I will be completely aligned on this issue as he would be if a rugby player was going to rugby league. There won't be an issue between the NRL and the ARU," he said.
"It'll really be an issue that we need to talk to, once we understand the issue in detail, there'll be a conversation with the FFR in France that will be responsible for talking to their club.
Illicit drug policies are determined by individual competitions, not covered by the World Anti-Doping Agency, and as such are not enforced internationally but Pulver said the status quo was satisfactory with the players the primary focus.
"The illicit drug policy – I think this will be an area of focus for all sport and there are different number of strikes that you can have across code, it is fair to say that illicit drugs are a real problem in Australia and right around the world," he said.
"How we deal with it is a really sensitive issue and in the large part we put in place policies designed to improve the environment for the individual.
"We're really worried less about the sport, we're trying to create an environment that's constructive for the individual. Across all codes, if you breach the policies in relation to illicit drugs, you're not going to play the game for very long.
"So, I think there's still room for further development but I think we're all focused on the right issues and that is player welfare,"
Source: rugby.com.au
