Skiing: Reedie goes out on a limb to back Baxter

Skiing's fallen hero presents a plausible case but, says Alan Hubbard, may have to take his medicine

Surely it was with unconscious irony that the British Olympic Association's choice of venue for their official announcement of the confiscation of Alain Baxter's bronze medal by the International Olympic Committee was Shoeless Joe's, a fashionable bar and bistro on London's Embankment. It happens to be named after the American baseball player who, 83 years ago, was involved in one of the most notorious episodes in sporting history. Emblematic or plain coincidence?

"Shoeless" Joe Jackson helped throw a match which cost the Chicago White Sox the World Series, and was subsequently banned for life. "Say it ain't so, Joe," his supporters had famously but had vainly pleaded.

So had Baxter's, though his offence was hardly in the same league, and as he spoke hesitantly, and almost inaudibly, before an irritatingly muted microphone on Thursday afternoon he was always unlikely to reply, as Joe did, "I'm afraid it is." Unfortunately the IOC were not for turning; now his only hope is that the Court of Arbitration for Sport will quash his disqualification. But, like the IOC, which partially funds it, this is based in Lausanne and not his Scottish habitat.

There they'll support him, Aviemore. As, apparently, will the BOA, to whom it is viewed as a totally innocent mistake, this whiff of scandal that has cost Baxter and Britain their first-ever medal on snow, alongside the MBE that surely would have accompanied it later.

So, sinner, scapegoat or just plain stupid?

To prove he is none of these Baxter has, with the backing of the BOA and the British Ski Federation, embarked on a publicity offensive even more positive than his dope test. His easy availability for interviews has been on the Neil and Christine Hamilton scale.

Determinedly upfront, though far from arrogant, and armed with two tubes of Vicks, one of which, purchased in a supermarket in Salt Lake's Park City (he wisely avoids using the American term drug store) contained traces of the stimulant methamphetamine, Baxter continues to present a plausible defence.

It is not, however, one which cut any ice with the IOC nor will it, one suspects, with the four-man panel of independent lawyers appointed by the Court of Arbitration. Ignorance of the law has never been much of a defence when you are up before the beak.

While it has been a testing time for Baxter, in every sense, a fellow Scot has been just as much on trial. Craig Reedie, the Glasgow financial adviser, has given the slalom skier his unstinted support as the chairman of the BOA.

But his has been a delicate balancing act, for he also sits as a British representative on the IOC alongside the Princess Royal, and now Matthew Pinsent, both of whom, if you'll pardon the phrase, are distinctly sniffy about drugs.

So, indeed, is Reedie, under whose aegis the BOA have introduced a life ban from the Games for any British athlete who gets caught in the drugs net. Moreover, Reedie happens to be one of the significant figures involved in the war against drugs cheats as treasurer of the World Anti-Doping Agency.

Yet he has chosen to go out on a limb for a fellow countryman. Are we talking double standards here?

Reedie ponders the question. "I accept I have to wear a number of hats in this situation but I have chosen to support Alain because I really do not believe he is a cheat. He is the victim of an unfortunate set of circumstances. What he did he clearly did inadvertently.

"OK, so we may speak with the same accent but I had never even met the lad until Salt Lake City. I feel he has been harshly treated and has paid a hellish penalty for what I see as a modest misdemeanour."

Reedie ackowledges that his stance invites invites the cynicism of those who suggest he has compromised his position on both the IOC and the anti-doping agency. "First and foremost my duty is to our athlete," he explains. "In a situation like this I have to choose which hat to wear. At both Alain's hearings I made it clear to the IOC that I was there in my capacity as chairman of our National Olympic Committee, and this was accepted.

"As such my job was, and still is, to do the best I can for my athlete. I can't walk away from that. What I would say to the IOC is that in a case like this where there are two types of metamphetamine, only one of which is clearly a narcotic, they should take a fresh look at the regulations. But I fear they will always say they must maintain their policy of strict liability."

Reedie says it is now Baxter's call as to whether he appeals to the Court of Arbitration, who rejected a plea by the young Romanian gymnast Andreea Raducan after she lost a gold medal in similar circumstances.

Any ban on Baxter by the International Ski Federation is likely to be a token one of three months rather than two years. And in view of the sympathy and support already extended to him it is improbable that the BOA will impose their life ban. So he might be best advised to take his medicine, and remember always to read the label in future.